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ΡΕΙΝΟΕΤΟΝ, Ν. J. 


ΒΕ Goo :-Ἐ5Ὶ -1901 | 
Fisher, George Park, 1827- 
1909. 

The beginnings of | 


Chrictianity 


THE 


BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


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THE 


BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY 


WITH A 


VIEW OF THE STATE OF THE ROMAN WORLD 
AT THE BIRTH OF CHRIST. 


BY / 


GEORGE P. FISHER, D.D. 


PROFESSOR OF ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY IN YALE COLLEGE: 
AUTHOR OF “ESSAYS ON THE SUPERNATURAL ORIGIN OF CHRISTIANITY,” 
““7HE REFORMATION,” ETC. 


NEW YORK 
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 
1901. 


Πάντες yap ἄνθρωποι περὶ θεῶν. ἔχουσιν ὑπόληψιν. 
ARISTOTLE, de Οαἰο, I. 3, 


Aliud est de silvestri cacumine videre patriam pacis . . . et ali- 


ud tenere viam illuc ducentem. 
AUGUSTINE, Confess., VII., xxi. 


Salvation is of the Jews, 
JOHN iv. 20. 


We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the 


power may be of God and not of us. 
II Cor. iv. 7. 


Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1877, by 
SCRIBNER, ARMSTRONG & CO. 


In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 


TO 
EDWARDS AMASA PARK 
ΑΒ A TOKEN OF RESPECT FOR HIS SERVICES 
IN PROMOTING THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE 
AND OF GRATITUDE FOR PERSONAL KINDNESS 


THIS WORK IS DEDICATED 


BY THE AUTHOR. 


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PREFACE. 


In this volume—which is founded on a Course of Lectures 
delivered at the Lowell Institute, in Boston, in February and 
March, 1876—I have undertaken, first, to describe the ancient 
Roman world, including both Heathen and Jewish Society, 
into which Christianity entered, and in which it first estab- 
lished itself; secondly, to examine the New Testament docu- 
rnents from which our knowledge of the beginnings of the 
Christian religion must be derived; and thirdly, to discuss 
some of the most important topics connected with the Life of 
Jesus and the Apostolic Age. The title given to the Lectures 
was the “Rise of Christianity and its Historical Environ- 
ment,” the last term being borrowed from the students of nat- 
ural science; but finding that this title, although a good 
equivalent for my own conception, needed explanation, I have 
exchanged it for one expressed in plainer words. 

Under the first of the heads above named, in addition to the 
preparation for Christianity which was furnished, in a more 
external way, by the unification of mankind under the Roman 
Empire, I have dwelt upon the less familiar but more deeply 
interesting branch of the topic—the mental and moral prep- 
aration for the Gospel, which was partly the result of the 
Roman polity, but which flowed, also, from the entire develop- 
ment of the ancient religion and philosophy. I should be glad 
to inspire my readers with the interest which I feel in this 
portion of the subject, especially in tracing the affinities be- 
tween the noblest products of the poetry and philosophy of 
Antiquity and the Christian faith. The best of the Fathers 


Vi PREFACE. 


discerned so clearly the peculiarity of the Gospel, and the 
short-comings of Philosophy even in its best estate, that they 
did not fear to recognize the large measure of truth which 
heathen sages had embodied in their writings. Justin Martyr 
tells us that Christ was known in part to Socrates, he being 
enlightened by the Word.* Augustine was roused from sen- 
suality and ambition by “the incredible ardor” which was kin- 
dled in his mind by a passage in the “Hortensius” of Cicero 
on the worth and dignity of philosophy, and burned, as he 
says, “to remount from earthly things to God.”* He af 
firms that Christianity is as old as the creation.* He speaks 
very often of the near approach of Platonism to Christian doc- 
trine ;* yet he does not find in the Platonic writings a way of 
salvation: “No one hears Christ call, in these books—‘Come 
unto me all ye that labor.’”> When we pass within the circle 
of Revealed Religion, and mark the divine training of the 
Hebrew People, in its successive stages, we understand how it 
is true that “ Salvation is of the Jews.” In the introductory 
chapter, I have dealt with this topic, and have illustrated the 
manner in which, as I conceive, the gradually developing char- 
acter of Revelation contains a solution of moral difficulties in 
the Old Testament. 

In the second division of the work, I have to take the reader 
into the field of New Testament criticism. It is necessary to 
investigate the origin and credibility of the New Testament 
histories, in the light of modern researches and controversies.® 
I must leave it to others to judge of the degree of candor and 
thoroughness with which the investigations under this head 
have been pursued. No one who has kept up with the German 
literature in this province can fail to have observed that the 


1 Apol. ii. 10. 2 Confess., iii. 7. 3 Retractt., I. xiii. 3. 

4 E. g., de vera Religione, 8. 5 Confess., vil. 27. | 

6 In a former work, (Essays on the Supernatural Origin of Christianity, 
1865; 3d ed., 1870), some of these questions were considered. In the 
present volume nothing is reproduced from that work; but I have taken 
the liberty occasionally to refer to it for a more full discussion of certain 
special topics, 


PREFACE, Vii 


ground taken by the Tiibingen school respecting the “ ten- 
dency,” or theological bias, of the first two Gospels, and of the 
writings of Luke, is not now maintained by critics of an inde- 
pendent spirit, such as Reuss, Holtzmann, and Mangold. Is 
it too much to believe that a similar retrogression may be ex- 
pected in the case of the Fourth Gospel? The two great criti- 
cal questions are the credibility of the Acts, and the author- 
ship of this Gospel. On the first of these questions, as it 
appears to me, the most enlightened criticism is moving 
steadily towards a general recognition of the trustworthiness 
of Luke. Respecting the Fourth Gospel, there are no present 
signs of an approaching unanimity of judgment. For one, I 
cannot bring myself to believe that this Gospel was manufac- 
tured by a Christian believer early in the second century, and 
palmed off on the churches of Asia where John had lived and 
died. For the attempt of Keim and Scholten to drive the 
Apostle out of Asia can only be considered as a desperate ex- 
pedient to escape a conclusion which seems inevitable from 
the fact of his having lived and taught there. While I reject 
the extreme positions of the Tiibingen school, I should be the 
last to deny that, directly or indirectly, by its agency, and 
especially by the labors of the late Dr. Baur, a flood of light 
has been thrown upon the New Testament period. What life 
and movement there was in the Apostolic age! What momen- 
tous questions were agitated among the Apostles themselves! 
What a progress of doctrine among them! And how wide of 
the mark, in many particulars, is the popular apprehension of 
the opening era! 

After having formed a judgment of the character and value 
of the original documents, the way is open for the considera- 
tion of certain main points in the life and ministry of Jesus, 
together with the leading events in the Apostolic age, The 
chapters under this head conclude with a description of the 
characteristic features of early Christianity. 

In prosecuting the studies, the results of which are included 
in this volume, I have resorted to the primary sources; and I 


Vil PREFACE, 


venture to hope that, here and there, especially in the part 
relating to the New Testament writings and their contents, I 
have been able to set forth some points in a somewhat clearer 
light than has been done heretofore. Where I have been 
assisted by the labors of others, it is little to say that I have 
exercised an independent judgment, and have tested statements 
and opinions by the evidence on which they claim to rest. I 
wish, however, to give full credit to the modern writers to 
whom I am most indebted. Upon the Greek religion I am 
under large obligations to the excellent treatises of Nagels- 
bach on the Homeric and Post-homeric Theology. Although 
I have been guided by him, to a considerable extent, even 
in the order of topics, yet it is proper to say that in al- 
most all cases, the illustrative passages from the ancient au- 
thors were selected by myself, in my own reading.” Upon 
the history of the Jews, and their social and religious life, I 
must, first, gratefully own my indebtedness to Ewald. His 
faults—his arrogant temper in relation to other scholars, and 
the dogmatic tone in which unverified conjectures are put on a 
level with demonstrated truth—lie on the surface, and are 
patent to all. But not less obvious are his profound and 
exact learning, with which is blended a rare ability to seize 
on comprehensive points of view, and, I will add, his unaf- 
fected piety. I have derived aid from the recent German 
works on the contemporary history of the times of Christ. 
Hausrath I have consulted with profit, although I differ 
widely from his critical views; but the condensed, lucid, and 


1 Die homerische Theologie in ihrem Zusammenhange dargestellt, 
von Carl Friedrich Nagelsbach, 1840. Die nachhomerische Theologie 
des griechisch. Volks-glaubens bis auf Alexander, dargestellt von Dr. 
Karl Friedrich Nigelsbach, Prof. d. Philolog. zu Erlangen. 1857. 

? The extracts from Homer are given from Mr. Bryant’s translation; 
those from Aischylus and Sophocles from the translations by Mr. Plump- 
tre; and the passages from Plato are cited from Prof. Jowett’s version 
(the ed. in 4 vols., 1861). But I have usually given the original text 
of the ancient authors, for the benefit of those who prefer to translate for 
themselves. 


PREFACE. ix 


thorough work of Schiirer,’ which confines itself to the Jews, 
I have found of great service. Derenbourg, among others, 
has supplied me with information from Rabbinical sources. 
Gfrérer has been useful upon the subject of the Jewish The- 
ology in the time of Christ. I have not neglected the modern 
Hebrew scholars, Jost, Gratz, Herzfeld, Geiger, and others. 
On various points of Jewish history I have referred with ad- 
vantage to Milman, and to the graphic pages of Stanley. As 
to Roman customs and manners, I owe most to the compact 
and well-digested treatise of Friedlander.’ Although I cannot 
always follow him to the full extent, in his judgments respecting 
ancient society, where they depart from the usual opinions, I[ 
have drawn freely from the invaluable store of facts which he 
has collected. As regards the Reforms of Augustus, the work 
of M. Boissier on the Roman Religion from Augustus to the 
Antonines, has been of advantage. The Histoire des Theories 
et des Idées Morales dans 0 Antiquité, of M. Denis, has brought 
to my attention certain aspects of this subject which, without 
lits aid, I might have overlooked. When a student in Ger- 
many I translated, and published in an American Journal, 
an Essay of Neander on the Relation of Grecian to Christian 
ethics.* That Essay, more than anything else, has stimulated 
me to the study of Greek Philosophy in this particular rela- 
tion, and some of its thoughts will no doubt be found in the 
chapter on that subject. 

With respect to the critical discussions upon the New Testa- 
ment books, and upon the early Christian history, I have not 
undertaken to make references to the copious literature any far- 
ther than was absolutely needful. It seemed undesirable to do 


1 Lehrbuch d. Neutestamentl. Zeitgeschichte, von Dr. Emil Schiirer, 
A. o. Prof. d. Theol. zu Leipzig. 1874. 

? Darstellungen aus ἃ. Sittengeschichte Roms in d. Zeit von August bis 
zum Ausgang d. Antonine. Von Ludwig Friedliinder, Professor in 
K6nigsberg. Th. i. (ed. 4), 1873; Th. ii. (ed. 3), 1874; Th. iii. (1871). 

3 Bibliotheca Sacra, vol. x. 

* Wissenchaftl. Abhandlungen, von Dr. August Neander, pp. 140- 
214. (1851.) 


x PREFACE. 


more in this direction, as I have written, not for scholars and 
ministers alone, but also for the cultivated public who are inter- 
ested in such inquiries. Besides, the best works on the Introduc- 
tion to the New Testament supply this information, and the stu- 
dent has access to the accurate and exhaustive bibliographical 
Articles of Professor Abbot, in the American edition of Smith’s 
Bible Dictionary. It gives me pleasure to express the obliga- 
tions I am under to the writings of Professor Lightfoot. The 
frequent references which I have naturally been led to make 
to them, indicate better than any words of eulogy can do, my 
appreciation of the scholarship, candor, and critical tact which 
characterize them. Those who have long been accustomed 
to look to the Germans to lead the way in these studies must 
hail with peculiar satisfaction the appearance, in our own lan- 
guage, of works of so high merit. The writings of Lightfoot, 
Westcott, Ellicott, Jowett, Stanley, Discussions like those of 
Mr. Hutton and of Mr. Sanday upon the Fourth Gospel, even 
the Essays of Matthew Arnold, unsatisfactory as many of the 
opinions expressed in them may be, and the anonymous work 
entitled “ Supernatural Religion,” which reproduces the most 
extreme theories of the Tiibingen School, all indicate that the 
barren age of English Theology, in the department of Criti- 
cism, is fast drawing to a close. 

It remains for me to make my grateful acknowledgments to 
my friends, Mr. W. L. Kingsley, and Professor L. R. Packard 
of Yale College, for the assistance which they have given me 
while this volume has been passing through the press. 


NEW HAVEN, September, 1877. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER I. 


THE NATURE OF CHRISTIANITY AND ITS RELATION TO THE JEW- 
ISH AND HEATHEN RELIGIONS . δ > . . δ 


CHAPTER II. 


THE ROMAN EMPIRE AS A PREPARATION FOR CHRISTIANITY . 


CHAPTER III. 


THE POPULAR RELIGION OF THE GREEKS AND ROMANS ., . 


CHAPTER IV. 


THE POPULAR RELIGION OF THE GREEKS AND ROMANS AND ITS 
DECLINE . . ° . . . . . . . . 


CHAPTER V. 
THE GREEK PHILOSOPHY IN ITS RELATION TO CHRISTIANITY . 


CHAPTER VI. 
THE STATE OF MORALS IN ANCIENT HEATHEN SOCIETY . - 


CHAPTER VII. 


THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS CONDITION OF THE JEWS AT THE 
BIRTH OF CHRIST . . . . . 


ΧΙ 


PAGE 


40 


74 


112 


140 


191 


221 


ΧΙ CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


THE FIRST EVANGELICAL RECORDS: THE GOSPELS OF MARK 


AND OF MATTHEW STs CUM ΠΡ se Ge me 
CHAPTER IX. 

THE WRITINGS OB LUKE) 2) =: “ss = 6° .6 © «ne 
CHAPTER X. 

THE GOSPEL OF JORN °°") 28 ON eS el ΠΡ" 
CHAPTER XI. 


WATER-MARES OF AGE IN THE NEW TESTAMENT HISTORIES . 


CHAPTER XII. 


THE CRITICAL TREATMENT OF THE NEW TESTAMENT HISTORIES 


CHAPTER XIII. 


JOHN THE BAPTIST AND THE BEGINNING OF THE MINISTRY OF 
JESUS . δ . .- . δ δ e . . 0 . 


CHAPTER XIV. 


THE PLAN OF JESUS AND HIS MEANS OF ACCOMPLISHING IT . 


CHAPTER XV. 
THE SEPARATION OF THE CHURCH FROM THE TEMPLE . . 


CHAPTER XVI. 


THE SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE . . 


CHAPTER XVII. 


THE CHARACTERISTICS OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CEN- 
TURY . δ . . . . . - . . . . 


208 


286 


320 


363 


390 


416 


441 


469 


506 


546 


THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY 


WITH A VIEW OF THE STATE OF THE ROMAN WORLD 
AT THE BIRTH OF CHRIST. 


CHAPTER I. 


THE NATURE OF CHRISTIANITY AND ITS RELATION TO THE 
JEWISH AND HEATHEN RELIGIONS. 


CHRISTIANITY is an historical religion. It is made up 
of events, or, to say the least, springs out of events which, 
however peculiar in their origin, form a part of the history 
of mankind. This characteristic of Christianity is sug- 
gested on the first page of the New Testament, where we 
find the genealogy of Jesus carried back, through David, 
to Abraham, the progenitor of the Hebrew nation. The 
Evangelist Luke, a Gentile by birth, sets his narrative in 
connection with universal history. He tells us that “in 
the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Cesar, Pontius 
Pilate being governor of Judea,” Herod and others ruling 
in Palestine and the adjacent districts, Annas and Caiaphas 
being the high priests at Jerusalem, there began the series 
of events which he proposes to record.’ He will describe 
transactions that took place, at a definite epoch, in a par- 
ticular province of the Roman Empire. And the lineage 
of Jesus he follows back to Adam.? The Apostle Paul re- 
fers to the birth of Christ as having occurred “when the 
fulness of time was come.”* His thought evidently is, 


1 Luke iii. 1, 2. ? Luke iii. 38. 3 Gal. iv. 4. 
1 


2 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


not only that a certain measure of time must run out, but 
that a train of historical events and changes must occur 
which have the coming of Christ for their proper sequence. 
Of the nature of these antecedents in the previous course 
of history, he speaks when he has occasion to discuss the 
relation of the Mosaic dispensation to the Christian, and 
to point out the aims of Providence in regard to the Gen- 
tile nations. It was formerly a mistake of both Orthodox 
and Rationalist to look upon Christianity too exclusively 
as a system of doctrine addressed to the understanding. 
Revelation has been thought of as a communication writ- 
ten on high, and let down from the skies,—delivered to 
men as the Sibylline books were said to have been con- 
veyed to Tarquin. Or, it has been considered, like the 
philosophical system of Plato, a creation of the human in- 
tellect, busying itself with the problems of life and des- 
tiny: the tacit assumption in either case being that Chris- 
tianity is merely a body of doctrine. The truth is that 
Revelation is at the core historical. It is embraced in a 
series of transactions in which men act and participate, but 
which are referable manifestly to an extraordinary agency 
of God, who thus discloses, or reveals Himself. The su- 
pernatural element does not exclude the natural; miracle 
is not magic. Over and above teaching, there are laws, 
institutions, providential guidance, deliverance, and judg- 
ment. Here is the ground-work of Revelation. For the 
interpretation of this extraordinary and exceptional line 
of historical phenomena, prophets and apostles are raised 
up,—men inspired to lift the veil and explain the dealings 
of heaven with men. Here is the doctrinal or theoretical 
side of Revelation. These individuals behold with an open 
eye the significance of the events of which they are wit- 
nesses, or participants. The facts of secular history require 
to be illuminated by philosophy. Analogous to this office 


THE NATURE OF REVELATION. 3 


of philosophy, is the authoritative exposition and comment 
which we find in the Scriptures along with the historical 
record. The doctrinal element is not a thing independent, 
purely theoretic, disconnected from the realities of life and 
history. These lie at the foundation ; on them everything 
of a didactic nature is based. This fact will be impressively 
obvious to one who will compare the Bible, as to plan and 
structure, with the Koran. 

The character of Revelation is less likely to be miscon- 
ceived when the design of Revelation is kept in view. The 
end is not to satisfy the curiosity of those who “seek after 
wisdom,” by the solution of metaphysical problems. The 
good offered is not science, but salvation. The final cause 
of Revelation is the recovery of men to communion with 
God ; that is, to true religion. Whatever knowledge is com- 
municated is tributary to this end. 

Hence the grand aim, under the Old Dispensation and 
the New, was, not the production of a Book, but the train- 
ing of a people. To raise up and train up a nation that 
should become a fit instrument for the moral regeneration 
of mankind was the aim of the old system. A deep con- 
sciousness of this high providentiai design connected with 
them as a people, pervades the Hebrew mind from the be- 
ginning. In the darkest hours of their national history, 
this conviction bursts forth in the exultant strains of pro- 
phecy. The purpose of Providence might be imperfectly 
understood, crudely defined, especially in the earlier ages ; 
it might even engender pride and narrowness, and be turned 
into a spring of fanaticism; yet it was a great, inspiring 
faith, and has been justified by the history of mankind down 
to the present hour. The Hebrew people were in the end 
fitted for the office which, even in the far-distant past, they 
had expected to fulfill. 

Under the new or Christian system, the object was not 


4 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


less the training of a people; not, however, with any limi- 
tations of race. The fruit of the system was to be a com- 
munity of men who should be “the light of the world,” 
and “the salt of the earth.” 

The Scriptures which, when collected into a volume, are 
called the Bible, are the records and monuments of this long 
process of divine training. They are the original documents 
through which we get an authentic knowledge of this his- 
torical process in its consecutive stages. Whether narra- 
tives, devotional lyrics, ethical treatises, the fervid utterances 
of prophets, or the didactic and admonitory letters of 
Apostles,—the compilation of these writings into a volume 
was not included in the intention of their several authors. 
These wrote, as they were moved to write, under the pres- 
sure of the circumstances that surrounded them; in some 
cases to meet special exigencies, in all cases for the particu- 
lar benefit of those to whom their compositions were de- 
livered. In the growth of the Bible the providential de- 
sign outran the thoughts and purposes of the individual 
writers. 

The grand idea of the kingdom of God is the connecting 
thread that runs through the entire course of divine Reve- 
lation. We behold a kingdom, planted in the remote past, 
and carried forward to its ripe development, by a series of 
transactions in which the agency of God mingles in an 
altogether peculiar way in the current of human affairs. 
There is a manifestation of God in act and deed. Verbal 
teaching is the commentary attached to the historic fact, 
ensuring to the latter its true meaning. For example, the 
emancipation of the Israelites from bondage in Egypt was 
the standing illustration of the character of God, who re- 
vealed Himself in that act, and the symbol of the great 
redemption from sin, itself not less an act and achievement 
than the event which prefigured it. All Apostolic doctrine 


CHRISTIANITY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT RELIGION. 5 


is the exposition of the events of the Gospel history—an 
unveiling of their true import. 

The historical basis of Christianity marks the distinction 
between Christian theology and metaphysical philosophy. 
The starting-point of the philosopher is the intuitions of 
the mind: on them as a foundation, with the aid of logic, 
he builds up his system. His only postulates are the data 
of consciousness. In Christian theology, on the contrary, 
we begin with facts recorded in history, and explore, with 
the aid of inspired authors, their rationale. To reverse 
this course, and seek to evolve the Christian religion out of 
consciousness, to transmute its contents into a speculative 
system, after the manner of the Pantheistic thinkers in 
Germany, is not less futile than would be the pretence to 
construct American history with no reference to the Puri- 
tan emigration, the Revolutionary war, or the Southern 
Rebellion. The distinctive essence of Christianity evapo- 
rates in an effort like that undertaken by Schelling in his 
earlier system, and by Hegel, to identify it with a process 
of thought. 

Christianity stands in organic connection with the Old 
Testament religion, both being parts of a gradually devel- 
oping system. 

Of the Hebrew people, Ewald writes: ‘The history of 
this ancient people is, at the foundation, the history of the 
true religion passing through all the stages of progress by 
which it attained to its consummation; the religion which, 
on this narrow territory, advances through all struggles to 
complete victory, and at length reveals itself in its full 
glory and might, to the end that, spreading abroad by 
its own irresistible energy, it may never vanish away, 
but may become the eternal heritage and blessing of all 
nations,”’! 


1 Gesch. ἃ, Volkes Israel, i. 9. 


6 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


The Christian religion does not profess to spring from an 
absolutely new and independent beginning. The very 
name “Christ” is an Old Testament title. The Founder 
of Christianity, and his immediate followers, were Jews,— 
earnest believers in the doctrine of Moses and the prophets. 
For all that they did and taught, they claimed some kind 
of warrant in the Old Testament Scriptures, which they 
constantly cited. We have scanty information relative to 
the childhood and youth of Jesus; but there can be no 
doubt that the one book in his hands, the one book that, 
more than any other external influence, evoked within him 
the consciousness of his peculiar relation to God, and office 
among men, was the Old Testament. As he brooded over 
its contents, this consciousness, indistinct in his earliest 
years, gradually assumed the clearness and certainty of an 
intuition. When he would declare to his own townsmen 
at Nazareth who he was, and what his work was to be, he 
took in his hand the roll of the Prophet Isaiah, and read a 
passage from 1.1} The New Testament is steeped in the 
Old. The Greek of the New Testament is tinged through- 
out with the Hebrew idiom, and betrays, in matter as well 
as in style, on every page, the influence of the ancient 
books. “Salvation is of the Jews.”? 

It is equally true, however, that Christianity is an ad- 
vance upon the Old Testament religion. It is a further 
step in the progress of Revelation. What mischief has re- 
sulted from overlooking this truth, and from treating the 
earlier and later dispensations as in all respects on a level! 
The Mosaic legislation has been sometimes considered a 
perfect model for political communities to follow, in Chris- 
tian times. Religious intolerance has appealed in self-de- 
fence to Hebrew enactments. But the Old Testament re- 
ligion was an imperfect, because an inchoate system. It 


1 Luke iy. 16-31. 2 John iv. 22. 


THE OLD TESTAMENT THEOCRACY. τ 


was rudimental, introductory to something better, by which 
it was eventually to be superseded. The Kingdom of God 
existed at the outset in a national form, in the form of a 
theocratic state. A civil community was established, to 
which God assumed the relation of a law-giver. Civil, 
moral, and religious enactments—statutes framed to meet 
temporary needs and conditions, and laws which have an 
unchangeable validity—were mingled indiscriminately in 
one code, the design being to set the entire life in a direct 
relation to God, and to train a single people in the elements 
of true religion. In this nascent form of the Kingdom of 
God, an externality belonged to it which it was destined to 
outgrow, and finally to shuffle off. Taking our stand back 
at the organization of the theocracy, we can see how the two 
diverse elements that coalesce in its structure, must inevi- 
tably dissolve their unity, and we can divine the struggles 
that must eventually arise from the conflict of these ele- 
ments, and from the imperfect discernment of their mutual 
relations. There was, on the one hand, the political, na- 
tional element, local and limited in its very nature; and, on 
the other hand, there was the element of religion and the 
doctrine of God, in its nature universal and impartial. 
When the time shall come for this element to burst the 
bonds that confine it, will the local and temporary polity 
be ready to give way? Will not men cling to it as an end 
in itself? The whole history of Israel is the record of the 
expansion of the germ of pure religion, until the time 
should come for it to separate completely from the entan- 
glements of the theocratic polity, 

It is plain that the religious consciousness, or the gene- 
ral type of religious ideas and feelings, rises higher and 
higher as we pass from one epoch to another of Hebrew his- 
tory. Only by degrees did that which was latent in the 
relation assumed by God towards men come to the light. 


8 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


How scanty and indistinct are the references to a future 
life in the earlier books of the Old Testament! Sheol, the 
realm of the dead, is a dark, gloomy, subterranean abode, 
a land of shadows and forgetfulness. Advancing toa later 
age, we find in some of the Psalms brighter hopes for the 
righteous, and retribution anticipated for the wicked. In 
the canonical books written last, immortality and the resur- 
rection are distinctly asserted. The rewards and punish- 
ments of the law were temporal. The sense of a moral go- 
vernment was kept alive by visible allotments of justice, 
within the circle of earthly experience. 

The Messianic expectation, the great prophetic feature 
of the Old Testament, emerges from a vague presentiment 
into a definite and concrete form. It is like a vast object 
seen far off in a mist, which acquires definite outline the 
nearer it is approached. As the ideal of the kingdom ex- 
panded before the imagination of poet and seer, the con- 
ception of the Messiah, through whom the ideal was to be 
realized, gained a corresponding development. 

Every one sees that the Prophets stand on a higher 
mount of vision than belonged to the age of Moses. In 
Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, a broad view is taken of the 
providential plan, in which the mighty Powers then on the 
stage—Assyria, Babylon, Egypt, Persia—play each an ap- 
pointed part. We have the beginning of a philosophy of 
history, from the right point of view, where the Kingdom 
of God is made the final cause of the rise and fall of em- 
pires. There is, moreover, a more vivid discernment of the 
spirituality of religion. A sharp line of discrimination 18 
drawn between moral and ceremonial enactments. This is 
a step in advance of the Mosaic Revelation. Ceremonies 
and outward services are relegated to a subordinate place. 
No more scorching denunciations of formalism in religion 
were ever poured out from human lips. Pure affections 


THE PROGRESS OF REVELATION. 9 


and righteous conduct are what Jehovah demands: He de- 
lights ‘not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he- 
goats.” ? 

In like manner, the religious consciousness of the Mosaic 
period is perceptibly in advance of that of the primitive era 
of which we have glimpses in the Patriarchal traditions 
that form the Prolegomena to the Mosaic legislation. It is 
evident that a book having the characteristics of Job must 
have been composed much later than the date of these tra- 
ditions. The problems which are agitated in this book 
belong to an age of reflection. It would be an anachronism 
to put them in the primeval times.? A book like Ecele- 
siastes evidently falls much later than Job. It belongs 
chronologically in the third and final section of the Hebrew 
canon. 

The Hebrew Scriptures themselves point forward to an 
epoch when the Old Testament system is to resolve itself 
into something higher. The words of John the Baptist, 
“He must increase, but I must decrease,” ὅ indicate the feel- 
ing that belonged to the highest representatives of the Old 
Economy. It was felt to be the forerunner of a more per- 
fect system. What other religion ever foretold its own 
disappearance? It is true that there was felt to be a per- 
manent, as well as a transient element in the religion of 
Israel. It was never to be utterly thrown aside, like a 
worn-out garment. There wasa life in it that would never 
become extinct. The distinct foresight of what was to fol- 
low was not possible to the vision of prophecy. When the 
Prophets depicted the future destiny of the Old Testament 
religion, they could not so far transport themselves beyond 
their age as to discriminate precisely between what was to 
endure and what was to vanish away. Hence Jeremiah 


Ὁ {81 1 2 See Bleek, Finl. in d. A. T., p. 659. 
3 John 1ii. 30. 


10 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


declares that a man shall never be wanting to sit on the 
throne of David, nor Levites to offer sacrifices on tke al- 
tar. “The Jew,” observes Dr. Payne Smith, “could only 
use such symbols as he possessed, and in describing the per- 
fectness of the Christian Church, was compelled to repre- 
sent it as the state of things under which he lived, freed 
from all imperfections.” ? Nevertheless he beheld in the 
dim future a momentous crisis and revolution, when, in a 
manner that he could but imperfectly portray, old things 
were to pass away, anda new order of things was to arise in 
their place. Had it been granted to an ancient prophet 
to foresee the rapidity of modern travelling, it is too much 
to expect of him that he should describe the steam-engine; 
he would picture to himself the end as attained by a preter- 
natural perfection given to the steeds and vehicles with 
which his eyes were familiar. A more full and literal pre- 
diction would imply that the goal had already been reached. 
The Prophet Jeremiah, in another place, standing on the 
pinnacle of Old ‘Testament inspiration, predicts a mighty 
change in religion: “ Behold, the days come, saith the 
Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house 
of Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to 
the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that 
I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of 
Egypt.” The covenant made at the Exodus, proclaimed 
at Sinai, is to be superseded by one of a different nature. 
“This shall be the covenant that I will make with the 
house of Israel: after those days, saith the Lord, I will put 
my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; 
and will be their God, and they shall be my people.”” This 
is the first characteristic of the new covenant: the law is to 
be converted from an outward statute into a transforming 
principle. And the second characteristic is expressed in 


1 Jer. xxxiii. 18. 2 “Speaker’s Commentary,” in loco. 


THE PROGRESS OF REVELATION. 11 


the words: “I will forgive their iniquity, and I will re- 
member their sin no more.” * ‘The free forgiveness of sin 
is to take the place of the infliction of penalty. These two 
cardinal features are to distinguish the new charter, in 
comparison with the old. The outward spread of the king- 
dom is equally an object of glowing anticipation. ‘There 
shall be an handful of corn in the earth upon the top of the 
mountains; the fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon.’ 2 
If the coming glory of the kingdom was sometimes figured 
under the symbols of the Davidic monarchy, spreading its 
conquests among the heathen, and of the sanctuary at Je- 
rusalem attracting the most remote nations to worship 
within its walls, this, again, was an unavoidable limitation 
imposed upon the prophetic mind. It must frame its vi- 
sions out of materials within the circle of experience. It 
was true of the most illuminated of the prophets, as Ewald 
says, that, ‘as soon as they ventured on more explicit in- 
dications of the form which the future would take, they 
were unable to think of it except as linking itself to that 
spot on which the sanctity of the true religion had already 
obtained an abiding seat and a distinct shape for so many 
centuries ; for the imagination of the true Prophet never 
Joses itself in shapeless and unsupported visions.” ὃ 

That Christianity is a higher stage in a process of reve- 
lation, the New Testament leaves us no room to doubt. 
Christianity did not confine itself to the mere reform of a 
traditional system which had fallen into degeneracy. Ra- 
ther was it claimed that, in the Gospel, Revelation was car- 
ried far above the level which it reached at the purest 
epoch of Judaism. It was indeed a reform, but it was 
something more. It was affirmed that while, among all the 
worthies of the Old Testament, no greater personage had 
appeared than John the Baptist, the least in the kingdom 


* Jer. xxxi. 31-35, 2 ῬΡΆ, Ιχχὶϊ. 16. 3 Geschichte, iv. 43. 


12 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


of heaven, which was now to burst through its confined, 
theocratic form, was greater than he. ‘The least disciple 
of Jesus was lifted above John by standing on a higher 
plane of divine revelation. The imperfection of Old Tes- 
tament law in comparison with Christian ethics is taught 
by Christ. He set his precepts in direct contrast with what 
had been said to them “of old time”? When He was 
consulted on the subject of divorce, and reference was made 
to the legislation of Moses, which permitted a husband to 
discard a wife by going through certain formalities, Jesus 
said that the Mosaic law on this matter had been accommo- 
dated to the hardness of men’s hearts.? It had been adapted 
to the obtuse moral perceptions prevalent at the time when 
it was given, and thus fell short of the ideal of morality. 
This memorable statement illustrates the remark of Herder 
that the defects of the Old Testament are those of the pupil 
and not of the teacher. The law of Moses went as far as it 
was practicable to go, in view of the debased condition of 
the people. To have attempted more would have been to 
accomplish nothing. The law of Moses was a good begin- 
ning. It called for an improvement upon the existing 
practice. It laid a degree of restraint upon lawless passion 
and caprice. It was a license in form, but a restriction in 
reality. But it did not, and could not, embody the true 
idea of the conjugal relation, as that idea lay at the begin- 
ning in the Creator’s mind. The New Testament law on 
this subject was the fulfilment of the Levitical rule. 

Moral difficulties in the Old Testament, both in its teach- 
ing, and in the recorded actions of good men, are in many 
cases removed by an application of the truth included in this 
pregnant declaration of Jesus respecting a single topic of 
duty. The doctrine of the ethical superiority of the Gos- 
pel to the Mosaic system is a plain inference from it. The 


* Matt. v. 21, 27, 33, 38, 43. 2 Matt. xix. 8; Mark x. 5. 


MORAL DIFFICULTIES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 13 


heroes of the Old Covenant who are named with honor by 
the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews,’ are men whose 
conduct was often repugnant to the standard of the Gospel. 
Of some of them it has been said that were they living 
now, in a civilized Christian state, they would be lodged in 
the penitentiary. Rahab and Samson, Gideon and Jeph- 
thah, are names that look strange when placed in the same 
category with the Evangelist John. It is enough to say 
that they did not live in the light of the Gospel. We do 
not expect men to see as well at midnight as at noonday. 
At a period of barbarism and wild anarchy, they had a faith 
in the Invisible, and a fidelity induced by it, which have 
an imperishable worth. They espoused the right side ina 
conflict on the issue of which was staked the weal of all 
future generations. The historic movement which they, 
often in a rough way, but at the cost of peril and sacrifice, 
helped forward, was in the right direction. Men must be 
judged in relation to their times. There are paintings pro- 
duced in the infancy of Art, which elicit sympathy, for the 
intent out of which they spring, and for the sentiment be- 
neath them which struggles for expression, though the ma- 
terials are crude, and the execution very imperfect. Thus 
it is with the moral and religious element that shines out 
even in the dark ages of Hebrew history. The general aim 
may be right, when the means chosen to reach it are the 
fruit of an uneducated moral sense. We must approach 
these ancient records in a catholic spirit, and with the same 
historic sense that we apply in judging the medieval cru- 
sader, or the soldiers of Cromwell. When the heart of 
Clovis, the chief of the Franks, had been touched by Chris- 
tian teaching, and he listened to the story of the crucifixion, 
as told to him by the venerable Remigius, the Bishop of 
Rheims, he cried out: “ Had I only been there with my 


1 Heb. xi. 


14 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Franks, I would have taught those Jews a better lesson!’’? 
It was the impulse of the impetuous disciple who drew his 
sword in the Garden. The act may be rebuked, but not 
the warm devotion, the honest though unenlightened zeal, 
that prompted it. 

The principle of “the gradualness and partialness” of 
divine Revelation helps to explain events in Hebrew history 
which otherwise are perplexing. The invasion and partial 
extermination of the Canaanites is one of these. Let us 
suppose for a moment that this had taken place, without an 
explicit command, under the ordinary Providence of God. 
Not only do we find in history that men are indiscriminately 
destroyed by pestilence and earthquake ; but that migration 
and conquest are means providentially employed for bring- 
ing retribution upon nations sunk ‘in corruption, and for 
planting the seeds of a better form of society. Suppose, 
then, that the Israelites, after their liberation from bondage, 
and their wanderings in the desert, animated, to use the 
language of Ewald, with the newly-roused energy of a 
unanimous faith in God, attacked the idolatrous tribes of 
Palestine, the worshippers of Baal, Astarte, and Moloch— 
names fitly adopted by Milton for the chiefs of Pandemo- 
nium—put a multitude of them to the sword, and drove 
the remainder, with the “human sacrifices and licentious 
orgies” of their religion, to the northern sea-coast of the 
country. Suppose that the natural and rational dread of 
the seductions of idolatry moved the best of them—their 
leaders—to insist upon a wholesale destruction and expul- 
sion of the inhabitants, whose iniquities they abhorred ; 
the intent being to isolate the worshippers of Jehovah from 
the contamination of heathenism. Two things, at least, 
are plain. The crusade sprang out of religious impulses. 
It was not personal vindictiveness ; however congenial the 


‘Neander, Church History, 111. 8. 


MORAL DIFFICULTIES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 195 


way of prosecuting the contest may have been with the 
barbarous methods of waging war then in vogue. And 
the alternative was rightly understood; it was either an 
unrelenting hostility, or a compromise and a mingling of 
the Hebrews and idolaters, which must have resulted in the 
extinguishment of the light of truth, dim as it was, of 
which the former were possessed. Had the world been 
different from what it was, had the Hebrews been different 
—more firm in their faith, more enlightened—the alterna- 
tive would not have existed. But it did exist; and the 
preservation of true religion in its germs, our Christian 
civilization to-day, are dependent upon the course that was 
actually taken, revolting as it would be to humane feel- 
ing, if repeated at a later day, and under altered circum- 
stances. Had the Canaanites been spared, the historic 
stream, narrow and turbid as it then was, would have been 
choked up, or turned out of its channel, instead of flowing 
on in a broader and clearer current, until, at a point far 
remote from its source, it issued in a pure Christian theism, 
the life of our civilization. 

All this is clear to the historical student, whatever may 
be his creed, who values the Christian religion, and dis- 
cerns the genetic connection of events. We must conclude 
that the extirpation of the Canaanites, the only means by 
which the contagion of their idolatry and sensuality could 
be avoided—* terrible surgery ” though it was, to borrow 
language of Carlyle in speaking of another matter—was 
yet a part of the wise and beneficent order of Providence. 
We must conclude, also, that it was the fruit of the highest 
religious impulses of the people who were charged with the 
seed of what is most precious in modern religion and civili- 
zation. Were this the whole case, we should have to say 
that the excesses springing from the untamed religious zeal 
of an uncivilized people, were overruled by Providence, 


16 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


educing good out of partial evil, in subservience to a far- 
sighted plan for the salvation of the human race. But if 
we bring in, as an additional element, the manifested will 
of God, as the warrant for their proceeding, they are raised to 
the level of executioners, not merely of a permissive, provi- 
dential appointment, but of a direct commandment. It 
becomes an instance where human agency is employed for 
the infliction of divine judgment, the agent consciously 
acting as the instrument of divine justice. 

How can such a commandment, enjoining indiscriminate 
massacre, be consistent with the divine attributes ? 

As far as the consequences are concerned, the destruction 
of life, there is no greater difficulty than exists in the case 
of a hurricane or a plague, which sweeps away myriads of 
both sexes and of all ages. 

As far as the effect upon the actors is concerned, there is 
no offence done to the moral sense; there is no such de- 
parture from the common ideas, the accepted laws of war 
and conquest in that age, as would produce a moral deteri- 
oration in the Israelites themselves. Rather is it true, that 
feeling themselves to be deputies of the Supreme Power for 
the execution of penalties, and for the carrying out of a plan 
not their own, they would perform their stern work with a 
kind of sacred enthusiasm, unlike the base feeling of malice 
and revenge, as for a private injury, and impressed at every 
step with their own exposure to a like retribution in case 
they trod in the path of those whom they were commanded 
to destroy. 

If they were used as a flail and a scourge, the victims 
of their hostility suffered no heavier calamity than has been 
visited by the will of Providence upon many a corrupt and 
enervated nation, which has been crushed under the foot 
of the invader ; while for the Israelites themselves a wall 
was built up around them against the pollutions of heathen- 


MORAL DIFFICULTIES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT, 17 


ism, and a sense of the guilt and peril of apostacy was 
gained, which their whole subsequent history proves that 
they could not afford to spare. 

Yet it may be said that the commandment took the form 
that it did take on account of “the hardness of their hearts.” 
Had they been more susceptible to the influence of gentler 
motives, less inclined to the debasing rites of idolatry, and 
had their moral sense been capable of discriminations which 
are easy to an educated conscience—in a word, had they 
stood upon a higher spiritual plane, the injunction. might 
have been different. It might then have been as safe for 
them to mingle with the heathen as it was in the later ages 
of their history, when no enticements and no terrors could 
move them to take part in idolatry. 

When the Israelites seized upon the mountains of Ju- 
dea, Samaria, and Galilee, and dispossessed their inhabi- 
tants at the edge of the sword, the divine behest by which 
they were impelled, evinced, both in its motive and in its 
form, the imperfect morality of the chosen people. The 
motive was to seclude them from the corruptions of idola- 
try; its form was accommodated to that low stage of moral 
discernment, where the guilt of the individual is conceived 
of as extending its pollution to the family and the clan, 
and where the obligation of love is limited by the bounda- 
vies of kinship. The evils inflicted were such as God has 
a right to inflict by human agency, and such as He does 
thus inflict in the course of His Providence ; the agents in 
the infliction of them acted up to the full level of con- 
scientious feeling to which they had attained. They did 
no violence to any moral instinct.’ The supernatural ele- 


* This solution of the problem suggested by the Wars of Extermina- 
tion, recorded in the Bible as undertaken by divine command, does not 
differ in the essential points from that offered by Dr. Mozly in “The 
Ruling Ideas in Early Ages, and their relation to Old Testament 
Faith,”—a work which I have examined since these pages were written, 


18 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


ment—the inspiration—that animated the Israelites to 
their crusade, is not more responsible for the imperfect 
morality of their conduct, than if that conduct had sprung 
altogether from their own undeveloped moral sense. [5 it 
asked, what then is the advantage of inspiration and su- 
pernatural guidance, if they go no farther in lifting the 
recipients above the level of natural conscience? The an- 
swer is that the test of a gradual Revelation is not its pre- 
liminary stages, but its final outcome. ὦ 


He says: “It seems to belong suitably to the Divine Governor of the 
world, to extract out of every state of mankind, the highest and most 
noble acts to which the special conceptions of the age can give rise, and 
direct those earlier ideas and modes of thinking, toward such great 
moral achievements as are able to be founded upon them,” (pp. 55, 56). 
“ A divine command to undertake a war of extermination could only, 
to begin with, necessarily have been a command by condescension to 
the defect in the state of man’s moral perceptions in that age.” “ What it 
[the command] starts from is the evil in man, and not the perfect good 
in the divine will,’ (p. 159). “That dispensation starts with the 
sanction of a class of actions, which could not be done by an enlightened 
people with full and mature moral perception,” (p. 170). 


‘This truth is well presented by Dr. Mozly in the last chapter of his 
Moral Ideas, etc.,—“ The End the Test of a Progressive Revelation.” 
(Lect. x.) 

Bishop Butler has the following interesting passage : 

“ Indeed, there are some particular precepts in Scripture, given to 
particular persons, requiring actions, which would be immoral and vi- 
cious, were it not for such precepts. But it is easy to see, that all these 
are of such a kind, as that the precept changes the whole nature of the 
case, and of the action; and both constitutes and shows that not to be 
unjust or immoral, which, prior to the precept, must have appeared and 
really haye been so; which may well be, since none of these precepts 
are contrary to immutable morality. If it were commanded to culti- 
vate the principles, and act from the spirit of treachery, ingratitude, 
cruelty ; the command would not alter the nature of the case, or of the 
action in any of these instances. But it is quite otherwise in precepts 
which require only the doing an external action; for instance, taking 
away the property or life of any. For men have no right to either life 
or property, but what arises solely from the grant of God. When this 


PROGRESS OF REVELATION. 19 


Each successive epoch in the progress of the ancient Reve- 
lation was attended with a corresponding development of 
religious and ethical ideas. Not only conduct, but also 
doctrinal and devotional utterances are homogeneous with 
the particular era in which they are found. The inspira- 
tion of prophets affords but a partial disclosure of truth ; 
it does not escape the limitations of time and situation. In 
the stormy period of the Judges, Deborah the Prophetess 


grant is revoked, they cease to have any rights at all in either. And 
though a course of externa! acts, which without command would be im- 
moral, must make an immoral habit, yet a few detached commands have 
no such natural tendency. I thought proper to say thus much of the 
few Scripture precepts, which require not vicious actions, but actions 
which would have been vicious, had it not been for such precepts; be- 
cause they are sometimes weakly urged as immoral, and great weight is 
laid upon objections drawn from them. But to me there seems no difli- 
culty at all in these precepts, but what arises from their being offences ; 
i. é.. from their being liable to be perverted, as indeed they are, by 
wicked, designing men, to serve the most horrid purposes, and perhaps, 
to mislead the weak and enthusiastic.” Analogy, Part ii. Ch. iii. Mr. 
Grote, in comments on this passage, in a note in his work on Plato 
(Vol. 111. pp. 394, 395), appears to think that a conservative Greek, on the 
same grounds, might have defended the obnoxious actsand commands of 
his divinities against one who would take them as examples for his own 
conduct. But Mr. Grote’s remarks involve several fallacies. The first 
is that they overlook the fact that the revocation of the grant of life and 
property by the Deity, in the cases supposed by Butler, is considered to 
be based on justice, and to be a part of a wise scheme of general govern- 
ment; whereas in the case of the myths in question, the gods act mani- 
festly from caprice, lust, and other obviously selfish passions. The in- 
ference to be drawn as to the character of the objects of worship in each 
ease is plain. Then, secondly, Butler implies that the precepts to which 
he refers are shown to be the sole warrant of the particular acts which 
they enjoin. They are so shown by the circumstances under which 
they are given, and—what is here specially worthy of note—by subse- 
quent revelations concerning human duties. Thus, these special com- 
mands are on a level with the injunctions of a magistrate to his deputies 
to take property or life, which these individuals, without the authority 
derived from the commands, would not think themselves to have a right 
to do. 


20 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


chanted a song of triumph over the fallen enemies of Israel. 
In this song, we read:. “ Blessed above women shall Jael 
the wife of Heber the Kenite be.”* Jael had treacherously 
slain Sisera whom she had decoyed into her tent. Noargu- 
ment is needed to show the inconsisteney of such an act 
with the precepts of Christianity. Yet it receives from 
the mouth of a Prophetess the most distinguished praise. 
The motive of the act was a high and unselfish one; the 
deed which sprang from it was wrong, though ignorantly 
done. “If we can overlook the treachery and violence which 
belonged to the morals of the age and country, and bear in 
mind Jael’s ardent sympathies with the oppressed people 
of God, her faith in the right of Israel to possess the land 
in which they were now slaves, her zeal for the glory of 
Jehovah as against the gods of Canaan, and the heroic 
courage and firmness with which she executed her deadly 
purpose, we shall be ready to yield her the praise which is 
her due.” “ Deborah speaks of Jael’s deed by the light 
of her own age, which did not make manifest the evil of 
guile and bloodshed; the light in ours does.” * What shall 
be said, in the light of the Gospel, of Deborah’s applause 
of Jael? It is merited if applied to the motive; it is mis- 
placed when directed to the act. The act was right “ac- 
cording to that dispensation,” where “ love your friend and 
hate your enemy ” was the highest recognized rule of con- 
duct. Deborah was cognizant of no broader rule of mo- 
rality.‘ 

Nowhere do the deepest emotions of the religious mind 
find so pathetic an expression as in the Psalms. Yet this 
collection embraces, in addition to lyrics composed by David, 
others of an earlier date, and many of later origin, ex- 


1 Judges v. 24. 2«« Speaker’s Commentary,” Judges y. 24, 
3 Tbid., Judges iy. 21. 
“See Dr. Mozly’s remarks, Ruling Ideas, etc., p. 163 seq. 


THE PROGRESS OF REVELATION. 21 


tending down beyond the Exile. And they bear the traces 
of the elder dispensation out of which they were produced. 
The Christian reader occasionally meets with imprecations 
that grate upon his ear, from their seeming antagonism to 
the humane precepts of the New Testament. This feeling 
is not confined to sentimental religionists who would sub- 
tract righteousness from religion. It is generally felt. 
Some have sought to construe these passages as a mere pro- 
phecy of what is actually to befall evil-doers; but this 
untenable interpretation simply shows the pressure of the 
difficulty which it seeks to avoid. Some would consider 
them an outburst of righteous indignation, free from all 
personal vindictiveness, like the ery of Milton in the Son- 
net upon the Massacre of the Waldenses : 

“Avenge, O Lord, thy slaughtered saints whose bones 

Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold.” 

More commonly it is alleged that such imprecations were 
uttered by David in his character as theocratic king, as per- 
sonating the Messiah, and with reference to the enemies of 
Christ. But if imprecations were uttered by David and other 
authors of the Psalms, from what may be called public con- 
siderations as distinguished from personal resentment, it 
still remains true that Jesus himself did not pour out mal- 
edictions against his foes, or against the enemies of his 
kingdom; for the denunciations uttered with reference to 
the Scribes and Pharisees (Matt. xxiii.), though expressive 
of indignation as well as grief, are not to be thus construed. 
On the contrary, He bade his disciples pray for those who 
hated them and their cause. They were rebuked for wish- 
ing to call down fire from heaven to consume his enemies. 
He himself prayed on the cross for the pardon of his de- 
stroyers. Among his precepts we feel ourselves in a new 
atmosphere, where the retributive sentiment is no longer 
uppermost. 


22 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


But do all the maledictions in the Psalms admit of being 
referred to sympathy with divine justice, as contrasted witl 
personal revenge? Is there not a residue which do noi 
come under this category? Who can suppose the 109th 
Psalm to emanate wholly from this impersonal motive, or 
to have been written by a Christian disciple? “Let his 
prayer become sin,” “let his days be few,” “let there be 
none to extend mercy to him,” “let his children be contin- 
ually vagabonds and beg,” “let his posterity be cut off ’— 
compare these invocations with the Sermon on the Mount. 

The truth is that the rule of retaliation—‘ an eye for an 
eye ”—had been given to them of old time, but Christ gave 
another law, the law of love. Forbearance, and mercy to 
enemies are not unknown to the Old Testament; but they 
are in the background. They did not find that place in 
the Old Testament type of piety, which is given them in 
the teaching and example of Jesus. If Christ had nothing 
new to teach, why should he teach at all? To expect all 
the characteristic graces of the Gospel in the writers of the 
Psalms, and to complain if they are absent, is not less un- 
reasonable than to wonder that flowers do not blossom 
in January. ‘The law was given by Moses, but grace 
and truth came by Jesus Christ.”' The revelation of jus- 
tice must precede that of forgiveness; and revenge, which 
Lord Bacon calls a kind of wild justice, bad as it is, is a 
less evil than torpidity of conscience. It was well that men 
should learn to abhor wickedness; the Gospel has taught 
us to discriminate between the evil principle and the person 
in whose character it mingles. ‘The method of progress in 
the revelation of the Gospel is like that which is to govern 
its spread : “‘ First the blade, then the ear, after that the full 
corn in the ear.”’? 


In the ancient Scriptures there is one book, analogous in 


sroohnuedlice 2 Mark iv. 28. 


THE PROGRESS OF REVELATION. 23 


its structure to the Psalms, but of an ethical character,— 
the Book of Proverbs. It is an “anthology from the say- 
ings of the sages of Israel, taking its name from the chief: 
est of them ;” for it is a compilation which did not see the 
light in its present form until centuries after the time of 
Solomon. It is like the Psalms, which are “an anthology 
from the hymns, not of David only, but of the sons of Ko- 
rah and others, some named, and some anonymous.” The 
Proverbs are distinguished from heathen literature of a si- 
milar kind by the characteristic elements of the Old Testa- 
ment religion which are found in them. The Fear of the 
Lord is made the beginning of Wisdom. Yet in the pro- 
minence given to prudential motives, in the stress laid 
upon temporal rewards, the difference of tone from that of 
the Gospel is manifest. It is the point of view of the ear- 
lier dispensation. 

The difference between the Christian and the Jewish 
Dispensation is affirmed by Jesus in the reply which he 
made to the disciples when they were disposed to call down 
fire from heaven upon the inhospitable Samaritans, in imi- 
tation of the Prophet Elijah. “ Wist ye not,” he said,— 
for the answer should probably be read as a question— 
“Wist ye not what manner of spirit ye are of ?”* The 
Spirit of God that animated them was a spirit of forbear- 
ance and love. The Spirit of God was with Elijah;* but 


* “Speaker’s Commentary,” Introd. to Proverbs. 

2 When the historical and progressive character of Revelation is 
clearly apprehended, the value of such books, for example, as Ruth, Es- 
ther, and Canticles, is easily discerned. There is no book in the Old 
Testament which does not aid in illustrating the Dispensation. The 
moral standards, the social and religious sentiments, engendered at a 
given stage of Revelation, are reflected in the contemporaneous litera- 
ture that springs up within its circle. All of this literature is stamped 
with a character which distinguishes it from the products of Gentile 
thought. 


3 Luke 1x. δ. * Compare Luke i. 17. 


24 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the retributive sentiment—the stern tone of justice—marked 
the elder Dispensation. It was a high, but not the highest, 
not the complete, expression of the principle of goodness. 

The superiority of Christianity over the Judaic system, 
and the fact that it effected more than a bare purification 
of a corrupted doctrine and ritual, are involved in the re- 
ply of Jesus to the question of his disciples about fasting— 
why he did not make them to fast, as John made his disci- 
ples. “ New wine,” he said, “must be put into new bottles.” * 
Institutions must conform to the doctrine which they em- 
body. They must be new, because that is new. A new 
type of piety must create a new ritual congenial with it- 
self. It will not brook customs incongruous with it. 
Closely connected as his religion was with the antecedent 
faith, it was yet no mere reproduction of the old. It was 
something original, differing from the former doctrine; 
though, in some sense, the complement of it. The New 
Testament authors call the hallowed rites of the Old Tes- 
tament, shadows,—unsubstantial images of the realities of 
which the believer in Christ is possessed.” Indignant that 
Christian believers should retreat back to the Mosaic ob- 
servances, the Apostle Paul styles them “weak and beg- 
garly elements,” or rudiments, which the Gospel has left 
behind.*? The law which formed the kernel of the Mosaic 
Revelation is described in its moral as well as ceremonial 
features, as a schoolmaster, taking charge of the unripe 
youth, and leading him toa place where this provisional 
office is superseded.* 

Apart from all other defects, the Apostle Paul sets forth 
the radical insufficiency of the Old Testament system. It 
was, In its predominant character, a law-system. Law, 
coming from without, had to encounter the principle of sin 


* Luke ν. 38, (Matt. ix. 17, Mark ii. 22.) Colo ὅπ 12 
3 Gal. iv. 9. 4 Gal. iti. 24, 25. 


THE PERFECTION OF CHRISTIANITY. 25 


within the soul; and law had in it no power of moral re- 
generation. The proper result of the Old Testament sys- 
tem, as the Apostle Paul explains it, was to make this fact 
manifest in the consciousness of men, and to awaken a 
yearning for deliverance from sin, through a power work- 
ing from within. The triumph of the Old Testament form 
of the kingdom was in the demonstration of its own fail- 
ure; its failure, that is, to do more than to pave the way 
for something more effective. The ancient theocracy 
wrought its victory and attained its end when it moved 
“a Hebrew of the Hebrews” to turn from it in despair, 
with the cry, “ Who shall deliver me?” 


We proceed a step further in the discussion, when we 
say that Christianity is the perfect form of religion. In 
other words, it is the absolute religion. It is the final out- 
come of this long process of growth. It is not an inchoate, 
defective system, destined to vanish, like Judaism, by being 
merged in a higher form of creed and worship. The interest 
that is taken at present in the study of comparative religion, 
the more charitable spirit in which heathenism and heathen 
philosophy are judged, and a wide-spread skepticism in re- 
spect to the miraculous element in Christianity, predispose 
many to reduce the religion of the Gospel to the level of the 
Jewish or even of the ethnic systems. Such plainly is not 
the view which Christianity, as presented in the New Tes- 
tament, takes of its ownrank. Mather is it the culminating 
point in the progress of Revelation, fulfilling, or filling out 
to perfection, that which preceded. Several considerations 
will tend to establish this claim. 

1. In Jesus Religion is actually realized in its per- 
fection. 

By such means alone could the kingdom of God on earth 
be consummated. This the Prophets, and especialiy Isaiah, 


26 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. © 


had discerned. ‘There must come some one who should 
perfectly satisfy all the demands of the true religion, so as 
to become the centre from which all its truth and force 
should operate.” “Unless there first comes some ore who 
shall transfigure this religion into its purest form, it will 
never be perfected, and its kingdom will never come. But 
he will and must come, for otherwise the religion which 
demands him would be false; he is the first true king of the 
community of the true God, and as nothing can be con- 
ceived of as supplanting him, he will reign forever in irre- 
sistible power.” “Before the lightning flash of this truth 
in Isaiah’s soul, every lower hope retreated.” This lofty, 
inspired ideal was fulfilled in Him who made it his meat 
and drink to do the will of God, and who drank the deep- 
est cup of anguish with the words: ‘‘ Nevertheless, not my 
will, but Thine, be done!’’? 

2. In Christ the Revelation of God to and through man 
reaches its climax. Revelation had been, from the begin- 
ning, the revelation of God. In the inspiration of the 
prophets, He became “at sundry times,” for a season, a liv- 
ing Power in the soul, exalting and prompting its natural 
activities. These revelations, temporary and sporadic, fore- 
shadow an abiding Presence of God in man, such as con- 
stitutes the peculiarity of the person of Christ. 

3. In Christianity the fundamental relations of God to 
the world are completely disclosed. The old dispensation 
was a long crusade against heathenism. Heathenism par- 
tially, if not wholly, merged God in nature. The first verse 
of Genesis is a denial of an element of heathenism that 
clings to it even in its most refined forms. The Zoroastrian 
religion, the nearest approach to pure theism, divided the 
work of creation between two eternal Powers. Plato held 
to the eternity of matter, to say nothing of the realm of 


1 Ewald, Geschichte, iii. 710, 711. 1 Luke xxii. 42. 


THE PERFECTION OF CHRISTIANITY. 27 


ideas. The Old Testament insists on the unity, the per- 
sonality, and the transcendence of God. He is above the 
world, and distinct from it. This truth being secured, it 
remained for the New Testament to bring forward its coun- 
terpart, the immanence of God. He is in the world, though 
not, as the Pantheist dreams, to be identified with it. Thus 
the New Testament rounds out the revelation of God’s 
essential relations to the world. 

4, Through Christ, the kingdom of God actually attains 
its universal character. 

The heathen religions belonged each to a particular na- 
tion. The divinities of every people were supposed to have 
appointed the rites of their worship within the territory 
which they protected. The religion of each country was 
interwoven with its civil constitution. It was part and 
parcel of a political system, and strongly reflected the pecu- 
liarities of the people in which it had arisen. Thus, instead 
of bringing men together in a common society, the heathen 
religions rather tended to keep them apart. Religion formed 
one of the barriers that separated nations from each other. 
Of necessity, Revealed Religion, at the outset, in its rudi- 
mental stage, was likewise national. It was confined within 
the limits of a civil community. Whoever would have the 
benefit of it must become, if he could, a member of that 
state. The privileges of the true religion were accessible 
only within the pale of a single people. Although they 
were ever assured that they were chosen, not because they 
were more deserving than others, but merely to be almoners 
of a blessing to mankind, yet their distinction might have, 
and did have, the effect even upon them to engender a 
proud isolation. Through Christianity, the external theo- 
eracy was dropped as a thing outgrown. Everything that 
was accidental, provisional, local, in religion, fell away. 
“Not in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem,” was the 


28 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Father to be worshipped ; His temple was to be in the hu- 
man soul.' In the new kingdom, there was neither Jew 
nor Greek, barbarian nor Scythian, male nor female, bond 
nor free.” That is to say, in this high fellowship of religion, 
distinctions of race, of sex, and of condition—as between 
masters and slaves—vanish. A common sympathy sweeps 
away the walls of separation between man and man. The 
heavenly good of the gospel is of such a nature that 
it can be offered indiscriminately to all. The sense of a 
common relationship to Christ and to God melts away all 
differences. The brotherhood of the race is no more a phil- 
osopher’s dream; it has become a realized fact. Appealing 
to a common religious sentiment, a common consciousness 
of sin and of the need of help, and offering a remedy that 
is equally adapted to all, Christianity shows itself possessed 
of the attributes of a universal religion. 

Christianity vindicates its claim to this character, as being 
a religion of principles, not of rules. The Old Testament 
system was predominantly legal. The duties of men were 
enumerated, one by one; worship in its minute details was 
prescribed. Nothing in this department was left to choice. 
The law of human conduct was splintered into a multitude 
of particulars. A thoughtful mind always feels relief when 
it can descend below rules to their ground and source. In 
proportion as one penetrates to the ground-work of princi- 
ples, he is enabled to dispense with rules. The soul be- 
comes a law to itself; the end which the soul sets before it is it- 
self'a criterion of what isto bedone andomitted. The rational 
perception and choice of an end of action bring freedom, 
emancipation. Conduct then flows from an interior im- 
pulse; it is a product of spontaneity. Christian life is not 
an “imitation” of Christ, in the ordinary conception of the 
term. It is a relation like that of the branches to the vine 


1 John iv. 21, 22. 7 Gal, iii. 28, Col. 111: 11. 


THE PERFECTION OF CHRISTIANITY. 29 


that infuses into them life. The work of the Gospel is de- 
scribed as a new creation in humanity ; its disciples as new 
creatures in Christ ; Christ as another Adam, a second head 
of the race.! 

It is evident, that a code of rules, however adapted to 
the condition of a particular nation, in a certain state of 
civilization, may not answer when circumstances are altered. 
A legal system, therefore, cannot be permanent; it can 
never be an absolute religion in the sense we have given to 
the term. But the Gospel establishes a filial relation be- 
tween man and God. It implants principles that can never 
become obsolete, because they coincide with rectitude itself, 
and can never need a supplement, since they involve in 
themselves all specific obligations. Itis not conceivable that 
any morecomprehensive principle should be brought forward 
t» supersede love. No type of goodness can ever be dis- 
covered that excels the spirit of Christ. Because Christian- 
ity contents itself with the inculcation of seminal principles, 
not seeking to dictate or restrain conduct farther than these 
may prompt, it shows itself the ultimate form of religion. 

It may be added that the institutions of the Christian 
religion—its polity and worship—are not cast into an in- 
flexible shape. They flow out of its own creative spirit, 
and are, therefore, subject to variation. Even the simple 
features of the polity and cultus, which have an authori- 
tative sanction, are in direct accord with the nature of 
Christian society. There are thus no unalterable forms of 
church government, and no unbending ritual, but room for 
that diversity which is required by differences in tempera- 
ment, and by different grades of culture. Those who 
contend for a leaden uniformity in things external, miscon- 
ceive the genius of the Christian religion. They lose sight 
of the catholic quality that belongs to it. 


* 2 Cor. v. 17, 1 Cor. xv. 45. 


30 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


The progress of religion within the circle of the Scrip- 
tures is not to be confounded with that kind of develop- 
ment through which Christianity has passed since it was 
first promulgated by the Apostles. That there has been a 
development since that epoch is no more than to say that 
Christianity is a living system. But there is this differ- 
ence; in the giving of Revelation, at each successive stage, 
and especially at the consummation, there was an incre- 
ment of its contents. New truths were added to the pre- 
vious stock. This is not true of Christianity since the 
Apostolic age. Those who consider the Gospel a purely 
natural product, would efface this line of demarcation be- 
tween Apostolic and post-Apostolic theology, and put both 
on the same level. Among the writers who have handled 
the subject with marke } ability are certain Roman Catho- 
lic authors, as De Maistre, and Mohler, on the continent, 
and Newman in England. As Newman, in his most in- 
teresting and suggestive Essay, has shown, political and re- 
ligious ideas are in their own nature fructifying. They 
do not, like mathematical truth, lie inert in the minds 
into which they fall. On the contrary, they produce a 
ferment. Christian truth affects in this living way the 
intellect, the emotions, and the will. The mind receives 
these ideas as into an alembic. It exercises upon them its 
analysis ; it formulates them, connects them with the rest 
of its beliefs, elucidates and defends them by blending 
with them collateral truth which they imply. Theology, 
or the translation of Christian truth into dogma, is the re- 
sult of this intellectual process. Christian ideas, likewise, 
and the objects of faith, excite the emotional nature. They 
call into life sentiments which incorporate themselves in 
Christian art and worship. In the proportion in which 
they transform the mind and character, they transform life. 
The ethical relations of Christianity are by degrees un- 


CHRISTIAN ETHICS. ol 


folded. New obligations are brought to consciousness, 
from day to day. Cruel amusements of heathen antiquity 
died out under the silent influence of the Christian spirit. 
An atmosphere of feeling is produced, in which unrigh- 
teous legislation and brutal punishments cannot survive. 
Less than a century ago, Christian ministers imported 
slaves from Africa for domestic service. When the Ameri- 
can Constitution was formed, Christian sentiment had not 
risen to a strength sufficient to forbid the continuance of 
the slave trade ; and it was allowed for a term of years. 
Now this traffic is treated as piracy by the Christian na- 
tions. The New Testament did not, in express terms, 
prohibit slavery ; but the spirit of Christianity abolished it. 
The treatment of the poor, of the insane, and of the suf- 
fering and afflicted classes generally, which failed to shock 
the Christian sense of a former day, is now felt to be in- 
human. AI] these developments, whether of thought and 
belief, of worship and devotion, of Christian politics, or 
morals, as far as they are sound or wholesome, are due to 
the genius of Christianity. Here is at once their source, 
and the touchstone of their character. As Protestants, we 
must demur to the doctrine that an infallible safeguard 
exists against the introduction of elements at variance with 
Christian truth, which may prove the germ of a false de- 
velopment. But even the writers to whom we refer, hold 
that the whole deposit of revealed truth was with Christ 
and the apostles, and is contained in their teaching. So 
far as the development is normal, it springs out of the 
primitive seed. What we behold results from a clearer 
understanding, a more vivid appreciation, of the truth set 
forth in the New Testament. To the sum and substance 
of this truth, nothing has been added. 

Christian ethics have sometimes been charged with fault. 


Mr. J. S. Mill, in his Essay on Liberty, says: “I believe 


oo THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


that other ethics than that which can be evolved from ex- 
clusively Christian sources, must exist side by side with 
Christian ethics to produce the moral regeneration of man- 
kind.”! He guards against misunderstanding, by add- 
ing: “1 believe that the sayings of Christ are all that I 
can see any evidence of their having been intended to be; 
that they are irreconcilable with nothing which a compre- 
hensive morality requires; that everything which is ex- 
cellent in ethics may be brought within them, with no 
greater violence to their language than has been done by 
all who have attempted to deduce from them any practical 
system of conduct whatever.”? If nothing more were 
meant than that the New Testament does not pretend to 
define all the particulars of duty, but leaves them in some 
cases to be inferred, Mr. Mill’s observation would be just. 
He refers, in support of his criticism, to the absence of any 
recognition, in Christian ethics, of duty to the state, to the 
negative character of Christian precepts, to an exclusive 
emphasis laid upon the passive virtues, and to the want 
of reference to magnanimity, personal dignity, the sense of 
honor, and the like,—qualities which, he says, we learn to 
esteem from Greek and Roman sources. 

The imputation that Christian precepts are pre-emi- 
nently negative, is surely not founded in truth. It is not 
“a fugitive and cloistered virtue” which is enjoined in the 
New Testament. To do good is made not less obligatory 
than to shun evil. The religion which has for its work to 
transform the world is not satisfied with a mere abstinence 
from wrong-doing. 

It is not true that by insisting on mutual benevolence, 
Christianity thereby weakens the force of particular obliga- 
tions. The Gospel does not frown upon patriotism any 
more than upon the domestic affections. Not the love of 


* Page 93. 2 Page 94. 


CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 99 


country, more than the love of kindred, is chilled by 
Christian teaching. The state, as well as the family, is 
recognized as a part of the divine order. It was an 
Apostle who loved his own nation so ardently that he was 
willing to be accursed for their sake. 

If the passive virtues are exalted in the Christian system, 
it is not as the substitute, but as the complement of quali- 
ties of another class. Revenge is unlawful; truth is not 
to be propagated by violence; but unrighteousness in 
every form is assailed with an earnestness that admits of 
no increase. Nor does the religion of the New Testament 
discountenance the use of force for the protection of society. 
The magistrate is the minister of God for the execution of 
justice. As for magnanimity, the sense of honor, and 
kindred feelings, they are included in the category of 
whatsoever things are true, honest, pure, lovely, and of good 
report.’ Christianity excludes nothing that is admirable 
from its ideal of character ; and if there be virtues which 
have flourished on heathen ground, Christianity takes them 
up, while at the same time it infuses into them a new 
spirit—the leaven of an unselfish love. 

Robust and aggressive elements enter into the Christian 
ideal of character; yet there was a reason why, at the 
outset, emphasis should be laid upon meekness, patience, 
resignation, and the other virtues called passive. The [068 
of a Christian were of his own household. All the forces 
of society, civil and ecclesiastical, were arrayed against 
him. There was the strongest possible need for the exer- 
cise of just these qualities. Particular affections, like the 
love of home and of country, have a root in Christian 
ethics. But since Christianity came into a world where 
patriotism, and other affections limited in their range, ex- 
ercised a control that supplanted the broader principle of 


“Phil, iv. 8. 
3 


34 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


philanthropy, it was requisite that the wider and more 
generic principle should be inculcated with all urgency, 
not with a view to extirpate or enervate, but to curb and 
purify subordinate principles of action. In Christian 
ethics, all the virtues, the milder and more negative, with 
the bolder and more heroic—courage in suffering, and 
courage in action, the self-sacrifice of the mother in her 
household, of the patriot on the battle-field, of the mis- 
sionary to distant nations—find a just recognition. 


We have now to inquire in what relation Christianity 
stands to the higher forms of heathen religion. 

Independently of the doctrine set forth, there is an un- 
deniable contrast between the tone of prophets and apostles, 
and that of heathen poets and sages in their loftiest moods. 
There is in the former a holy urgency, an authoritative 
directness, a pungency of rebuke, which strike the mind 
as a voice from within the veil. As in no other literature, 
the soul feels itself in contact with the supernatural. The 
human author speaks as one inspired, as the organ of the 
Eternal. ‘“ He taught them as one having authority ” ex- 
presses the feeling of those who heard Jesus.’ It indicates 
a character that belongs to the Bible, in distinction from 
all the products of heathen wisdom. 

Yet underneath the superstition of heathenism the 
Apostle Paul recognized a true seeking for God. He 
quoted with approval a sentence from a heathen poet to 
the effect that there is something in man akin to the divine 
nature.* He declares that if a law had been given to the 
Jews, the same was true of the heathen. They, too, had 
a law written upon the heart,—a rule which was implied 
in their judgments of one another.* The contents of this 
unwritten mandate of conscience corresponded to the moral 


1 Matt. vii. 29; Marki.22. 2 Acta xvii. 28. 3 Rom. ii. 14, 15. 


CHRISTIANITY AND HEATHENISM. 30 


precepts of the Old Testament. There were not wanting 
teachers, of whom Socrates was the foremost, to inculcate 
moral obligations. There were influences fitted to educate 
the conscience. The sense of sin was far from being con- 
fined to the Hebrews. It finds a deep utterance in the 
literature of other nations. 

Even the other element of the Jewish system, the ele- 
ment of prophecy, is not without its analogon among the 
heathen. There is a natural prophecy, the act of 

“the prophetic soul 
Of the wide world, dreaming on things to come.” 

There were yearnings that could not be met on the plane 
of natural religion, and under the order of things insepara- 
ble from heathenism. ‘The sense of an unnatural estrange- 
ment from one another, and from God, sprang up in the 
hearts of men. ‘There were walls of separation which had 
begun to chafe the spirit, but which it was impossible to 
surmount. There were ideas not to be realized under 
the divisive influence of Polytheism—‘“ luminous anticipa- 
tions ’’—glimpses, at least, of something better for man, 
yet beyond his reach. There was thus a kind of prophecy, 
as well as law, outside of Judaism. 

If all this be true, and if the heathen nations, as well as 
the Jews, were subject to a providential training, why not 
assign the same propzedeutic office to Gentile religion and 
philosophy that we assign to the Judaic system? Some 
have thought that we should do this; and among them, the 
eminent theologian, Schleiermacher. The arguments for 
this view do not lack plausibility. Heathenism, it is said, 
at least in its best representatives, was monotheistic. The 
Gentiles were equally objects of divine favor, and they were 
on the same footing, as regards the offer of salvation, as the 
Jews: “for there is no difference between the Jew and the 
Greek ” (Rom. x. 12). Moreover, it is a significant fact 


36 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


in connection with the first preaching of Christianity that 
the Gentiles were found, as a rule, more ready to receive 
it. The number of converts from the Jewish side was 
small in comparison with the multitude of heathen who 
welcomed the new faith. The Apostle Paul had been sur- 
prised—we might say, perplexed—by this unexpected and 
startling fact. This feeling in his mind was at the root 
of that whole discussion about election and the plan of 
God, in the Epistle to the Romans, which has been a battle- 
ground of theologians ever since. What could be the 
meaning of Providence? That the chosen people, the pos- 
terity of Abraham, should turn away from the blessing 
which the Gentiles were flocking to grasp! The immedi- 
ate cause which the Apostle assigns, was the unbelief of the 
Jews. A moral blindness had overtaken them. But if 
the Old Testament people had become degenerate, and if 
the heathen were more open to the truth than they, where 
lay the pre eminence of the Judaic system as a pedagogic 
instrument? Is not this a case where the tree is to be 
judged by its fruits? 

But this question is not one to be settled by a count of 
heads. It remains true that “salvation is of the Jews.” 
The fact of capital importance is that Judaism is the parent 
of Christianity. There was the hearth-stone of the new 
celigion. The new system sprang up on thesoil of the old, 
and could spring up nowhere else. ‘There were “the ora- 
cles of God;” there were the Messianic promises, and the 
aspirations kindled by them, in a form that made it possible 
for the Messiah to arise, with a full consciousness of his 
calling, and to be recognized by others. The peculiarity 
lies in the organic relation of the parts of the earlier Reve- 
jation to each other, and the collective relation of the whole 
of them to the Gospel. Hence, the earliest adherents of 
the Christian faith by whom it was first propagated in the 


CHRISTIANITY AND HEATHENISM. 37 


world, its authoritative expounders for all time, were of 
Jewish extraction. Among the heathen, on the contrary, 
the foregleams of the Light to come were disconnected, 
scattered. There was no steady advance. Why was there 
no defined Messianic expectation among them? Why was 
not the Messiah born of the Gentiles? The Platonic 
Philosophy has educated many, from Augustine to Neander, 
for the kingdom of Christ ; but out of Platonism the Gos- 
pel could not come. The kingdom of Plato is presented in 
“the Republic.” Nor would men imbued with Platonism 
have formed the best nucleus of the early church. In the 
first centuries, the attempt to sever the new dispensation 
from the old, and to degrade or ignore the Old Testament, 
resulted in the wild speculations of Gnosticism. The fate 
of the new system, thus torn from its organic relations, was 
like that of a ship, cut loose from its moorings, and left to 
drift whither it might. 

The privilege conferred on the Jews, in the special train- 
ing to which they were subjected, might, if abused, place 
them at a disadvantage as to receiving the Good News, even 
in comparison with the nations which had been suffered 
“to walk in their own ways.” “It might be,” says Dr. 
Arnold, “ that they were tempted by their very distinctness 
to despise other nations; still they did God’s work,—still 
they preserved unhurt the seed of eternal life, and were the 
ministers of blessing to all other nations, even though 
themselves failed to enjoy it.” It is a question how far the 
principle of Natural Selection will account for progress in 
the animal kingdom. It is certain that a principle of 
providential selection is often exemplified in history, in the 
dealings of God with mankind. Nations are sifted. <A 
process of judgment and of rejection is witnessed. ‘There is 
an apparent loss and waste ; as when a few blossoms only, 
out of a multitude, fructify. The Apostle Paul affirms 


38 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


this very principle of selection in the case of the Jews. 
There was an elect fraction who did not turn their backs 
on the Messiah—just as, in the days of Elijah, seven thou- 
sand were found who had not bowed the knee to Baal. 
Moreover, it must be remembered that in some cases the 
docility which the heathen manifested when the Gospel was 
first preached, was due to an influence of the Old Testa- 
ment religion upon them. 

The Apostle Paul illustrates the character of ancient 
heathenism, by comparing the Gentile part of the church 
to the wild olive grafted into the native olive.2 The wild 
olive is not worthless, but it can not bear savory fruit until 
it draws its sap froin the stock that has grown up in the 
garden of the Lord. The branches of this stock, it is true, 
were broken off; yet to the engrafted branch, which par- 
takes of its root and fatness, it is said: “Thou bearest not 
the root, but the root thee.” * In the same spirit, Schelling 
has called the heathen religions “ wild-growing.” They are 
like the flowers that spring up of themselves by the way-side, 
—not destitute of fragrance and beauty, yet inferior to the 
plants which have been watered and pruned by the hand 
of a skilful gardener. 

In the inquiries before us it is important to bear in mind 
the distinctive character of Christianity. It is a religion. 
It is not merely, or chiefly, an ethical doctrine. Morality 
finds a broader statement, a more solemn sanction, and, 
above all, gains a new motive. But the morals of the Gos- 
pel is not the first or the main thing. Gibbon plumes 
himself on finding in Isocrates a precept which he pronounces 
the equivalent of the Golden Rule. He might have col- 
lected like sayings from a variety of heathen sources ; al- 
though neither Confucius, nor any other of the authors in 
whom these sayings are found, contains the precept in a 


1 Rom. xi. 4. 2 Rom. xi. 24. 3 Rom. xi. 18. 


THE SUBSTANCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 39 


form at once positive and universal. But an ethical maxim 
not very remote in its tenor from the Golden Rule, may 
undoubtedly be cited from a number of heathen teachers, 
and also from the Rabbis. Nowhere else indeed does 
this precept have the prominence that is given it in the 
New Testament. But the originality of the Gospel does 
not consist in particular precepts for the conduct of life, 
however noble they may be. The obligation to be 
pure, truthful, just, even the obligation to forbearance 
and compassion, was not unknown to the sages of an- 
tiquity. On these points of duty, Christianity, to be 
sure, speaks with an impressiveness never equalled before. 
But apart from the holy fervor of its moral injunctions, 
there is not so much that is absolutely new. Christianity 
in its essence is a religion. 

Nor is it in any special truth, like the doctrine of im- 
mortality, that the substance of Christianity is to be found. 
Faith in immortality is not the exclusive possession of 
Christian believers. Philosophers argued for this doctrine, 
and some believed in it, with nothing to instruct them but 
the light of nature. They looked forward to a future state 
of rewards and punishments. The same thing might be 
said of various other propositions which are considered a 
part of religion. 

Christianity has been properly styled the religion of re- 
demption. Here lies its peculiarity. It is the approach 

of heaven to men; the love of God taking hold of men to 
lift them up to a higher fellowship... The originality of the 
Christian religion is to be sought in the character and 
person of Christ Himself, and in the new life that flows 
out from Him. 


40 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER IT. 


THE ROMAN EMPIRE AS A PREPARATION FOR CHRISTIANITY, 
| “THE coming of Jesus Christ is the providential justifi- 
cation of the conquering policy of the Senate.”’* The close 
relation of the Roman Empire to Christianity has not failed 
to strike thoughtful minds of whatever creed. A stern spi- 
rit, a hard, unrelenting policy, marked the steps of Roman 
conquest. To spare the submissive and war down the 
proud—parcere subjectis et debellare swperbos?—was the 
recognized maxim; but in practice the Romans not seldom 
fell below the measure of humanity dictated by this rule. 
There were flagrant crimes against civilization, like the de- 
struction of the great commercial cities of Carthage and 
Corinth, and the enslaving of their inhabitants. Yet in 
the coarse of events that built up the stupendous and long- 
enduring fabric of Roman dominion, even the Christian 
Fathers who reprobated those crimes, discerned a provi- 
dential purpose. 

Circumstances favored the growth of Roman power. 
Had Alexander the Great lived to carry his arms west- 
ward, the issues of history might have been wholly altered. 
Had Greece not fallen politically and morally, and had the 
kingdoms of the East not sunk into decrepitude, the subju- 
gation of these countries might have been impossible, and 
Rome might have been stopped in her career of conquest. 


1 Laurent, Rome, p. 8. 2 Virgil, din. VI. 483. 
* Augustine, de Civit. Dei, v. 12, 15 seq. 


THE EMPIRE AND THE CHURCH. 41 


But after Carthage, her great rival, had been crushed, there 
was no other people that had the energy requisite to with- 
stand her progress to universal empire. 

So extended was the sway of Rome, and so deep were its 
foundations, that it seemed incapable of overthrow, and 
came to be regarded as a part of the fixed order of things, 
on a level with the unalterable system of nature. Some 
of the early Fathers, therefore, looked forward to the sub- 
version of the Roman dominion as the precursor of Anti- 
christ, and the signal for the final catastrophe in the world’s 
history. The idea of the perpetuity of the Roman Empire 
entered deeply into the Christian thinking of the middle 
ages. That Empire was conceived of as the counterpart 
of the Church, securing that unity of mankind in the secu- 
lar sphere, which corresponded, as a necessary condition, to 
their unity in things spiritual. An imperishable State was 
mated to an imperishable Church. Hence when Europe 
crystallized anew under the auspices of the Franks, it was 
the revived Roman Empire of which Charlemagne became 
the anointed head; and the same Empire was continued, 
in all its sacred authority, under the line of German Em- 
perors. 

While the agency of Rome in paving the way for Chris- 
tianity has never been overlooked, the tendency has been 
to dwell too exclusively upon the external features of this 
preparatory work. The wide-spread peace consequent upon 
the subjection of so many nations to a common govern- 
ment, the facilities for travel and intercourse which were 
open to the first preachers of the Gospel, the shield thrown 
over them by Roman law, and other advantages of a kin- 
dred nature, have justly attracted notice. But there is ano- 
ther side to the influence of Rome that is even more im- 
pressive in connection with the subject before us. The ef- 


1 Tertullian, Apol., 32; Lactantius, Instt., vil. 19, 25. 


42 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


fect of the consolidation of so large a part of mankind in 
one political body, in breaking up local and tribal narrow- 
ness, and in awakening what may be termed a cosmopolitan 
feeling, is in the highest degree interesting. The Roman 
dominion was the means of a mental and moral preparation 
for the Gospel; and this incidental effect is worthy of spe- 
cial note. The Kingdom of Christ proposed the unification 
of mankind through a spiritual bond. Whatever tended 
to melt down the prejudices of nation, and clan, and creed, 
and instil in the room of them more liberal sentiments, 
opened a path for the Gospel. Now we find that under the 
political system established by Rome, a variety of agencies 
co-operated to effect such a result. Powerful forces were at 
work whose effect was not limited to the creation of out- 
ward advantages for the dissemination of the religion of 
Christ, but tended to produce a more or less genial soil for 
its reception. We have then to embrace in one view the 
influence of the Roman Empire in both of these relations, 
in shaping outward circumstances, and in favoring a men- 
tal habit, which were propitious to the introduction of the 
new faith. 

1. Glance at the extent and general character of the 
Empire established by the Romans. It stretched from the 
Atlantic to the Euphrates, a distance of more than three 
thousand miles, and from the Danube on the north, and 
the friths of Scotland, to the cataracts of the Nile and the 
African desert. All the tribes and nations inhabiting this 
immense territory had surrendered their independence, and 
were connected together in one political system. The Par- 
thians in the far East were left unsubdued ; and beyond 
the Rhine were the Germans whom the Romans failed to 
conquer, and could only repel to their native forests. There 
have been, and there are now, empires which cover more 
square miles; but the peculiarity in the case of Rome is 


THE DIVISIONS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. 43 


that she brought under her sceptre all the civilized nations 
of the world. And the relation of most of her provinces to 
the Mediterranean gave to her dominion a geographical 
unity. Of its entire population we have not the data for 
an exact estimate. It was somewhere from eighty to one 
hundred and twenty millions. 

The Roman world—orbis Romanus, as the Romans 
proudly called it—naturally divided itself into two regions, 
the East and the West." It was not a mere geographical 
line that separated them, but differences lying deep in his- 
tory and in the characteristics of their inhabitants ; so that 
subsequently, when the Empire was divided, it was not 
an accident that drew the line between these two grand 
sections. 

The East comprised that portion of Western Asia which 
was included between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean 
on the west, the Caucasus on the north, the valley of the 
Nile on the south, and the Caspian, the Euphrates, and the 
deserts of Arabia on the east. Egypt was placed by the 
ancients in Asia, and formed a part of the Orient. 

In the Isthmus between the Euxine and the Caspian, 
were the numerous tribes of the Caucasus, grouped in con- 
federacies or kingdoms under the protectorate of the Ro- 
mans. Mostly uncivilized, and in perpetual conflict with 
the Sarmatians, Scythians, and other Asiatic hordes which 
were already in motion, they formed the vanguard of the 
Empire. The Greek colonies along the coast of the Euxine 
served as a connecting link and a channel of commercial 
intercourse between the Caucasus and the East, and the 
civilized communities of the West. Armenia, harassed by 
the Arsacides, the Parthian rulers who’ held Babylonia and 


1 See Amedee Thierry, Tableau de ? Empire Romain, p. 84 seq., with 
the references. In the brief paragraphs which immediately follow, I 
am principally guided by M. Thierry’s sketch. 


44 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Chaldea, received its kings from the Romans, and was re- 
duced to a province by Trajan. In Asia Minor there was 
a mixture of various races. Besides the indigenous peo- 
ples, the Greeks had their ancient and flourishing cities on 
the sea-coast. The Thracians had made their way to the 
coast of Bithynia. Celtic invaders had penetrated into 
Phrygia, and founded there the Galatian kingdom. A 
branch of the Syrian race had planted itself in Cappadocia. 
And, after the expedition of Alexander, all these different 
nations were mingled with occidental Greeks. 

From the shores of the Halys eastward to the Tigris, 
and from the mountains of Caucasus on the north to the 
Arabian gulf, were spread the different branches of the Se- 
mitic race. On the north and extending to the Euphrates 
were the Syrians; in Palestine were the Hebrews, and upon 
the Tyrian coast the Pheenicians; in Babylon were the 
Chaldeans; while the nomadic Arab tribes roamed over 
the peninsula of Arabia and the plains of Mesopotamia. 
From the neighborhood of the Tigris, stretching toward 
the East, were the Persian dialects and nations. In the 
time of Augustus, the Roman boundary was the Euphrates, 
Arabia was still independent. 

The native Egyptian race remained unmoved in its tra- 
ditions, its social organization, and its religion; but in a few 
cities, of which Alexandria was the chief, under the auspi- 
ces of the Ptolemies, Greek civilization attained to a flour- 
isning development. Greece, which was considered to he- 
long to the East, where it eventually fell at the division of 
the Empire, had nothing to boast of, save its glories in the 
past. 

The primitive inhabitants of the African coast of the 
Mediterranean had belonged to one race, but had been di- 
vided into two aggregations or confederacies of tribes. West 


co ac 
of the Lybian nations, along the whole coast as far as the 


THE PROVINCES OF THE EMPIRE. 45 


ocean, the Moors or Numidians had established themselves, 
whom tradition had traced to Western Asia as their prior 
home. Upon these barbarous peoples had come in the 
Greeks, who planted themselves about Cyrene, and the 
Carthaginians who made their abode in Carthage and its 
dependencies. Malta and Sardinia attached themselves to 
Carthaginian civilization, but Sicily was essentially Greek. 
The fierce and warlike Iberians, the primitive inhabitants 
of Spain, whose territory was fringed by Carthaginian 
and Greek settlements, after yielding to the Romans, not 
only learned military discipline from their conquerors, but 
developed a taste for letters. Over Gaul and Britain were 
spread the Celtic race, with its various branches, of which 
we have so full a description in the Commentaries of Ceesar. 
The Romans generally included under the term I]lyricum 
the lands situated between Switzerland, Italy, and the Dan- 
ube, and the confines of Greece and Macedonia; lands in- 
habited by a multitude of petty nations, only a portion of 
whom had adopted, in any considerable measure, the arts 
of civilization. Thrace felt the beneficial effect of its con- 
tiguity to Asia, and to the Greek cities, especially Byzan- 
tium. 

The provinces into which the Roman world was divided 
were separated by Augustus (B.C. 27) into the proconsu- 
lar, under the rule of the Senate, and the imperial, which 
were governed by the lieutenants of the Emperor. In these 
last were placed the standing armies. In the Senatorial 
provinces, the Emperor’s authority, when he was present in 
person, superseded that of the proconsuls. In truth, the 
rule of the Senate within its own provinces was little more 
than nominal. Spain was divided into three provinces, of 
which the largest, Tarragona, in the north and east, and 
Lusitania, embracing the principal part of modern Portu- 
gal, were imperial, while Bzetica, which corresponds pretty 


46 = THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


nearly to the present Andalusia, with Seville and Granada, 
was under the Senate. Of the provinces into which Gaul 
was divided, Gallia Lugdunensis—so called from the flour- 
ishing colony of Lyons—and Belgica, lying beyond the 
Seine, with Aquitania, which extended from the Atlantic 
Ocean to the Rhone, were imperial, while Gallia Narbonensis, 
or Languedoc and Provence, was senatorial. Upper and 
Lower Germany, stretching from Basle to Leyden, on the 
west bank of the Rhine, were not constituted into provinces 
until later. They fell into the imperial class. Britain, 
also, was conquered, and became an imperial province in 
A.D. 43; comprising England, Wales, and the Lowlands 
of Scotland as far as the Friths. The other imperial pro- 
vinces, under Augustus, were Rheetia and Vindelicia, 
stretching from the top of the Alps to the Danube, and 
eastward to its junction with the Inn; Noricum, a battle- 
ground for the Roman legions and their German enemies ; 
Pannonia, east of Noricum, embracing modern Hungary 
and portions of Austria; Mocesia, whose barbarous inhabi- 
tants occupied the territory which is now known as Servia 
and Bulgaria, and which, with Pannonia, included the 
whole right bank of the Danube, from Vienna to the Black 
Sea ; and, in the East, Cilicia, Syria, Egypt. Dacia, on the 
north of the Danube, was not incorporated among the impe- 
rial provinces until its conquest in the time of Trajan (A. D. 
107). Under the sway of the Senate, besides Sicily, Sardi- 
nia and Corsica, of which, however, the last, together with 
Dalmatia on the east of the Adriatic, were subsequently 
allotted to the Emperor, were Gallia Narbonensis, or 
Languedoc and Provence, Beetica or South Spain, Dalmatia, 
Achaia, Macedonia, Cyprus, Bithynia, and Pontus, or the 
land south-west of the Black Sea, Asia—that is, the portion 
of Asia Minor to the west of Mt. Taurus and the River 
Halys, Crete, with Cyrenaica, or the northern coast of 


THE EARLIER EMPIRES. 47 


Africa, which is now divided between Egypt and Tripoli; 
Africa—that is, the main part of the ancient Carthaginian 
territory as far as the boundary of Mauretania between 
Cirta and Sitifis, now Constantine and Setif, in Algiers, 
Eastern and Southern Spain, the oldest of these pro- 
vinces, with the exception of Sicily, had been con- 
quered about the middle of the sixth century after the 
foundation of the city; the youngest, Egypt, Mesia, 
Pannonia, were annexed to the Empire as the fruit 
of the victory over Mark Antony; Pannonia not be- 
ing constituted a province until Α. Ὁ. 10. Italy, of which 
Augustus fixed the Northern boundary at the Var, was 
governed, not by a proconsul, but by the civil officers 
of its own colonies and municipalities; and was divided 
for administrative purposes into eleven regions or circles. ἢ 
There were districts under direct imperial control, which 
had not a regular provincial organization, but might be 
governed, like the Alpine districts, and Judea, by Pro- 
curators, or, in the case of Egypt, by a Prefect. 

Rome did not make the first experiment towards the 
unification of mankind in a political form,—the only form 
in which the ancients could conceive of such a union. 
There had arisen a series of great Empires, extending back 
to the dawn of authentic history. First, Egypt, then the 
earlier kingdom of Babylon, then the Assyrian Empire, 
then the later Babylonian kingdom, had each of them col- 
lected multitudes of men under the sway of a single master. 
These colossal despotisms, notwithstanding the oppression 
and cruelty that belonged to them, were necessary to the 
rise of civilization. They put an end to the isolation of 


*On the division of the Empire into provinces, see Marquardt in the 
Handb. d. rém Alterthiimer, Vol. iv. (1873); especially the table, p. 330 
seq. See, also, Von Reumont, Gresch. d. Stadt Rom, i. 217, and Merivale, 
Hist. of the Romans, i. 122. 


48 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


warring tribes. They brought men together in peaceful 
intercourse, within walled towns. There, since the arts of 
defence always kept in advance of the means of attack, the 
fruits of industry could be stored up, and the conditions oz 
society were fitted in some degree to stimulate imycntion 
and discovery. Yet under these old conquering powers, 
men were welded together in a mass; the individual 
counted for nothing. With the rise of the Persian mon- 
archy, dominion was transferred from the Semitic to the 
Aryan family. The Persians in many things anticipated 
the Romans. Great roads, for example, bound together 
the different parts of their Empire. Herodotus describes 
the grand highway stretching from Susa, the capital, 
to Sardes near the western coast of Asia Minor; along 
whose whole length of 1,500 miles, were placed, at short 
intervals, government stations, and fine caravansaries for 
travellers, and which was traversed by the couriers of the 
Great King, riding by post, in five or six days.’ 

But the nations subject to the Persian dominion were 
not assimilated. It was a conglomerate of tributary peo- 
ples, with no approach to an organic union among them. 
The Greeks attached a moral value to the individual ; 
through them a government of laws superseded the will of 
a despot, philosophy arose, and liberty and culture were 
appreciated. Yet the Greeks, notwithstanding their politi- 
cal talent, were driven by circumstances to organize them- 
selves in small communities. Their states were municipal. 
Their confederacies were loosely bound together, and easily 
dissolved. The allies of Athens were so harshly treated 
that they deserted her in the time of her deepest distress, 
and left her to be crushed by her enemies; while the wis- 
dom of Roman policy was manifest in the continued fidelity 
of the Latin allies in the great crisis of the struggle with 


* Hist. v. 52 seq. 


ROMAN CITIZENSHIP. 49 


Hannibal. The empire of the Macedonian conqueror 
fell to pieces at his death. It perished with its founder. 
He spread the Greek language in the East, and with it a 
tinge of Hellenic culture; but he founded no united 
dominion co-extensive with his conquests. Rome, on 
the contrary, which properly succeeded to the work of 
Alexander, moved forward with a slower but sure advance, 
and held whatever she won, not solely or chiefly by the iron 
grasp of military power, but rather by a sagacious policy 
which, without sweeping away local customs and laws, 
aimed to dissolve former political bonds, and to establish 
stronger ligaments of connection with herself. Through 
her colonial system she established bodies of trustworthy 
supporters in the very heart of the communities that she 
annexed. 

Rome did not begin, like the Greek cities, in the subju- 
gation of one race by a stronger which trampled under 
foot the subject population. In the Palatine settlement 
there was a combination of different tribes and races on a 
footing of equality, and it furnished an open asylum to 
fugitives of all sorts. A distinction of classes, and an ar- 
istocracy arose, and the exclusiveness of the Patrician order 
increased after the expulsion of the kings. But within the 
walls of the city, the Plebeians gained, step by step, the con- 
cessions which at last broke down all the barriers of 
privilege. In the treatment of allies without, there was 
an analogous growth of liberality. The inhabitants of 
certain towns—municipia—were granted the rights of 
Roman citizenship. Citizenship became not a local but a 
personal distinction. It embraced certain private rights, and 
certain political rights; these last being principally the right 
of suffrage, and eligibleness to office. One possessed of the 
full prerogatives of a citizen, wherever his abode might be, 
could present himself at Rome and take part in the elections, 

ζ: 


50 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


He belonged to a great fraternity—the civitas—actuated by 
common ideas, and taking pride in the possession of pecu- 
liar immunities and powers. The privileges involved in 
citizenship might be conferred on foreigners, in whole or in 
part. Not unfrequently upon Latin towns the private rights 
—for example, the right of commerce or of marriage 
with Romans—were bestowed, without the grant of politi- 
cal rights. ‘Thus there grew up in connection with the 
Roman hegemony in Latium, a legal system—the jus 
Latii—which defined the rights and privileges of these 
more favored cities ; and a similar system—the jus Italicwm 
—with reference to the Italic communities, which were 
favored, though in a less degree than the Latin towns.’ 
The struggle for equality on the part of the Latins and 
Italians resulted, in the end, in the communication of the 
rights of citizenship to all these allies. This advantage 
was gained by the Latins B.c. 90, by the Lex Julia, as 
the fruit of the Social War, and was soon after extended to 
the Italians. The territories outside of Italy, which were 
subject to Rome, were either provinces, free or confederated 
cities, or allied kingdoms. The jus Jtalicwm, and sometimes 
the jus Latii, was conferred upon cities, here and there, 
beyond the bounds of Italy. The tendency of historical 
changes was to diffuse abroad the privileges connected 
with citizenship. This tendency was strengthened by the 
conversion of the Republic into the Empire. Czsar had 
sedulously befriended the provinces, and in the civil war 
found in them his strongest support. By his victory, the 
democratic party of which Caius Gracchus may be con- 
sidered the principal founder, and which Marius had after- 
wards led, gained the ascendency, and the ruling oligarchy 
fell from power. It has been questioned whether Cesar 


*Upon the Jus Latii and the Jus Italicum, see Walter, Gesch. d. rém. 
Rechts, pp. 194, 196. 


COSMOPOLITAN POLICY OF CASAR. 51 


had distinctly in view the political elevation of the pro- 
vinces, or anything beyond their rescue from misgovern- 
ment. It is certain, however, that the party by which he 
was raised to power, had generally stood as the opponent 
of Roman exclusiveness, and that his own measures tended 
strongly in the same direction. The government of the world 
by a single city could not be perpetual. There was a constant 
reaction of the provinces upon Rome. A vast influx of for- 
eigners had filled the capital with a mixed, heterogeneous 
populace. The spirit and policy of Cesar were cosmopolitan. 
He scandalized conservative Romans by filling up the 
Senate with Gauls and other foreigners. He gave the suf- 
frage to transpadane Gaul, and annexed that province to 
Italy. The same privilege he conferred on many commu- 
nities and individuals in transalpine Gaul and in Spain. 
With the establishment of the Empire began a series of 
changes that led eventually to the granting of the rights of 
citizenship to all of its subjects. The tendency of the im- 
perial system from the beginning was towards administra- 
tive uniformity, and towards the effacing of the distinction 
between subject and citizen. It is significant that the pro- 
vinces were glad to see the rule of the Senate subverted, 
and the imperial government taking its place. Tacitus, 
speaking of the concentration of power in the hands of Au- 
gustus, says: “ Neither were the provinces averse to that 
condition of affairs; since they mistrusted the government 
of the Senate and people, on account of the contentions 
among the great, and the avarice of the magistrates ; while 
the protection of the laws was enfeebled and borne down 
by violence, intrigue, and bribery.” + Even the worst Em- 
perors, Nero not excepted, were sometimes not unpopular 
in the provinces, which felt their cruelty less than the Ro- 
mans themselves, and rejoiced in their own escape from the 


1 Annal., i. 2. 


52 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


tyranny and extortion of that class of Republican magis- 
trates of whom Verres was one. The main point is that 
under the Emperors Rome became merely the capital, in- 
stead of the mistress, of the world. In proportion as the 
government was resolved into an absolute monarchy, Rome 
was reduced to the level of other municipalities. At length 
the chiefs of the State came to be taken from the provinces, 
and in the end from the barbarians themselves. The level- 
ing influence of Roman absolutism, a tendency that inhered 
in it from the start, aided essentially in producing a sense 
of equality among men. 

2. Deserving of special mention is the unifying influence 
of Roman jurisprudence. 

The great system of law, the principal legacy of Rome 
to subsequent ages, was of gradual growth. In the middle 
of the 5th century B.c., the first written code, the Laws 
of the Twelve Tables, was composed. This continued to 
be an object of reverence and eulogy long after many of its — 
provisions had become antiquated, and vast additions had 
been made to its meagre contents. The annual Edict of 
the Preetor was the principal provision for the modification 
and expansion of the legal system, to meet the altered state 
of society, and the demands of an advancing morality. 
When this magistrate assumed his office, he was required 
to set forth publicly the rules on which he proposed to pro- 
ceed in administering justice; in particular the form and 
method of the remedies that would be open to litigants. 
The Edict constituted really a supplement to the established 
code, and a means of liberalizing as well as enlarging it. 
Beneficent legal fictions were introduced for the purpose of 
getting rid of the inconvenient formalism and unjust require- 
ments of the ancient system. The jus gentium was not 
without its influence in effecting this amelioration. This was 
not a system of international law. The Romans had no 


ROMAN LAW. 53 


such system, and did not recognize the equality of States, 
on which this branch of modern law is founded. The 
nearest approach to international rules was furnished by the 
jus feciale which defined the customs to be used in declaring 
and beginning wars ; but no inquisition into their justice was 
involved in its injunctions. The old jus gentiwm was nota 
rule for the intercourse of nations. It was simply the rules 
of proceeding in the case of sojourners not entitled to the 
privileges of Roman law; rules deduced by Roman officials 
from a comparison of their own system with that of the 
nations to which the class in question belonged. A com- 
mon law was sought for, which could be applied to the de- 
termination of causes in which foreigners were parties. As 
early as 247 B.©., a special magistrate, the Preetor Peregri- 
nus, was created to take cognizance of this class of causes. 
In the later days of the Republic, however, after the Stoic 
philosophy was naturalized at Rome, the lawyers who had 
imbibed its tenets, connected with the Roman Law the Stoic 
idea of a universal law of nature or reason, which under- 
lies all particular codes, and is exalted above them in rank. 
The jus gentium came to be identified in this way with 
the jus naturale.’ Cicero, in the “Commonwealth” and 
in the “ Laws,” frequently dilates upon the Natural Law, 
and upon the great community of gods and men, of which 
each single country is only a portion, or a constituent part. 
“This universe,” he says in a passage of the last named 
treatise, ‘forms one immeasurable commonwealth and 
city, common alike to gods and mortals. And as in 
earthly States, certain particular laws, which we shall 
hereafter describe, govern the particular relationships of 
kindred tribes ; so in the nature of things doth an universal 
law, far more magnificent and resplendent, regulate the 
affairs of that universal city where gods and men compose 


* See Hadley, Introd. to Roman Law, p. 92. 


54 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


one vast association.” ’ Of law he writes in another place 


of the same work, that “it was neither excogitated by the 
genius of men, nor is it anything discovered in the progress 
of society ; but a certain eternal principle which governs 
the entire universe, wisely commanding what is right, and 
prohibiting what is wrong.” ἢ 

As we shall see hereafter, the doctrine of a Natural Law, 
the expression of general justice and reason, did not remain, 
in imperial times, a barren maxim. It affected to some ex- 
tent the contents of the law. For example, it softened the 
legislation relative to slavery, and thus mitigated the rela- 
tion of master and slave. 

Through the Pretorian Edicts, there grew up, by the 
side of the old law, a more broad system of Equity. The 
Edict was termed perpetual, as not being subject to altera- 
tion during the term of office of the Preetor who issued it. 
Finally, under Hadrian, a Perpetual Edict was composed 
or compiled by Salvius Julianus, which was to be open to 
no further increase in the future.* Through the labors of 
jurisconsults from about 100 B.¢., this great body of sup- 
plementary laws was reduced to a scientific form. 

The Roman Law was for Roman citizens alone. For 
example, a sojourner at Rome, or a provincial in his own 


1 οἱ jam universus hic mundus una civitas communis deorum atque 
hominum existimanda; et quod in civitatibus ratione quadam, de qua 
dicetur idoneo loco, agnationibus familiarum distinguuntur status, id in 
rerum natura tanto est magnificentius, tantoque preclarius, ut homines 
deorum agnatione et gente teneantur. De Legibus, L. i. 7. 


2 _legem neque hominum ingeniis excogitatum, nec scitum aliquod 
esse populorum, sed zternum quiddam, quod universum mundum regeret, 
imperandi prohibendique sapientia. Leges, L. ii. 4. 


3 This is Mr. Maine’s view of the controverted question as to the na- 
ture of the work done by Julianus. See Ancient Law, pp. 61, 63, and 
Prof. Dwight’s remarks, p. xxv. (Am. ed., 1877); also, Phillimore’s Ro- 
man Private Law, p. 53. Compare, however, Wenck’s note in Smith’s 
Gibbon, i. 268, and Merivale, Hist. of the Romans, vii. 426. 


SPREAD OF ROMANO—HELLENIC CULTURE. 55 


home, could not have the aid of the Roman magistrate in 
enforcing the father’s authority —the patria potestas— 
which was so fundamental a feature of the Roman code. 
And the same was true of all the rights and immunities 
which were inseparable from citizenship. But wherever 
there was a citizen, this law was operative. Hence in the 
colonies everywhere, justice was administered according to 
its provisions. This, however, was far from being the li- 
mit of its operation. The governors of provinces issued 
edicts analogous to those issued by the pretors. In 
these, they proclaimed the rules and methods by which 
they would abide in the administration of justice. While 
the local laws and customs were left in force, especially in 
minor causes, the Roman law was not without a decided 
and increasing influence upon the programme of the prefect, 
and upon the whole judicial administration of the pro- 
vinces.. This was more likely to be the case as the Edict 
would often be prepared at Rome, and under the advice 
of lawyers. As the bounds of citizenship were extended, 
the sphere of the Roman law was, of course, correspond- 
ingly widened. In the period when Christianity was spread- 
ing in the Roman world, the minds of men were becoming 
more and more familiar with this legal system. It was 
one of the means of reducing to homogeneity the component 
parts of the Empire. The conceptions that entered into the 
warp and woof of this great code were insinuating them- 
selves into the common thinking of mankind. 

3. We have to refer to the assimilation of mankind in 
language and culture. 

The monarchy that was formed under the auspices of Ju- 
lius Cesar was Romano-Hellenic in its essential character. 
Τὸ was not a sudden creation; the materials of it had been 
long in preparation. The two nations which the policy of 


1 See Walter, Gesch. d. rom. Rechts, Ὁ. 436. 


56 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


this great statesman aimed to unite as the main component 
elements of the Empire, had long been acting powerfully 
upon one another, as well as upon the so-called barbarian 
peoples. The process of Romanizing and Hellenizing the 
nations—if these terms may be allowed—had begun centu- 
ries before. The Greeks, like the Pheenicians before them, 
were a maritime and colonizing people. Their cities on the 
Western coast of Asia Minor were founded prior to 776 
B.C., when the authentic history of Greece begins. The 
Greek towns in Sicily, and in the South of Italy, were some 
of them coeval with Rome. Cume preceded Rome by se- 
veral centuries. Greek settlements were dispersed on the 
islands and along the sea-coast of the Mediterranean. Mar- 
seilles was founded by Phocean colonists. From there 
Greek colonies planted themselves in Spain. The Greeks 
early came into close intercourse with Egypt; and through 
them was built up the flourishing city of Cyrene. The ex- 
pedition of Alexander extended far and wide the Hellenic 
influence. The foundation of the city of Alexandria was 
an event of vast moment in this direction. There a multi- 
tude of Greeks were collected, who made the place a great 
centre, not only of trade and manufactures, but of Hellenic 
philosophy and culture. At Alexandria, the streams of 
Jewish and Oriental thought mingled with the current of 
Greek speculation. Its population in the early days of the 
Empire was not less than one million. Recent excavations 
have uncovered the seven main streets, running in straight 
lines through the city, and the twelve other main streets 
that crossed them at right angles. Alexandria had an equal 
reputation for industry and thrift on the one hand, and for 
wit and learning on the other. The Museum, or Academy, 
and the Library, which were founded by the Ptolemies, 
were brilliant nurseries of scientific and literary study. 
Antioch, founded by Seleucus Nicator, rivalled the Egyptian 


SPREAD OF ROMANO—-HELLENIC CULTURE. δ᾽ 


capital in grandeur, and in the number and diverse nation- 
ality of its inhabitants. Its main street extended in ἃ 
straight line for four miles, and like the main street of Alex- 
andria, was bordered on both sides by colonnades. The 
rivals and successors of the Tyrians and Carthaginians, the 
Greeks transplanted their language to every port to which 
their ships sailed. But the Greeks were the lettered 
people of antiquity. Wherever a love of knowledge and 
of art was awakened, there Greek books penetrated, and 
Greek teachers and artists were welcomed. The downfall 
of Greek liberty, and the political and social calamities that 
followed, contributed efficiently to diffuse their language 
and learning. The phenomena, though on a vaster scale, 
may remind us of what occurred before and after the cap- 
ture of Constantinople by the Turks, in the fifteenth cen- 
tury. A multitude of Greek slaves, especially after the fall 
of Corinth, were brought into Italy. Roman households 
were filled with them. The conservative Roman spirit had 
at first resisted the introduction of Greek learning. Cicero 
refers to the prejudice of his grandfather against the study 
of the Greek language. Cato was for driving the embassy 
of Greek philosophers out of Rome. He opined the worst 
results from the introduction of their doctrines. There 
was a contest like that between the old learning and the 
new, which prevailed at the Renaissance. But it was vain 
to attempt to stem the tide of innovation. The Roman 
youth, if at all studious, could not be withheld from acquiring 
the tongue of Plato and Sophocles, from placing themselves 
under the tuition of Greek rhetoricians and philosophers, 
and even, as in the case of Cicero, from resorting to Athens 
for instruction. Greek was the language of commerce, and 
the vehicle of polite intercourse, far more even than was 
true of French, in Europe, in the age of Louis XIV. 
“Greek,” says Cicero, in his Oration for Archias, “is read 


58 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


in almost all nations; Latin is confined by its own boun- 
daries, which, of a truth, are narrow.”* “Wherever the 
Roman legionary went, the Greek schoolmaster, no less a 
conqueror in his own'way, followed; at an early date we 
find famous teachers of the Greek language settled on the 
Guadalquivir, and Greek was as well taught as Latin in 
the institute at Osca.”? To a vast number of Jews dwell- 
ing out of Palestine, Greek was the vernacular tongue. 
Two centuries and a half before Christ, the Septuagint ver- 
sion of the Old Testament had been made at Alexandria; 
and this was the Bible with which they were chiefly fami- 
liar. But the inhabitants of Palestine itself, like so many 
other peoples at that time, were bilingual. Their narrow 
strip of territory was bordered on the east and west by 
Greek-speaking towns. The disciples of Christ were doubt- 
less acquainted with Greek from their childhood. When 
the Apostle Paul was rescued from the mob at Jerusalem 
by a detachment of the Roman garrison, he craved the priv- 
ilege of addressing the people. When they found that 
he spoke to them in Hebrew—that is, Aramaic—“ they 
were the more attentive.”* It is implied that they would 
have understood him had he spoken in Greek, as they 
seemed to expect that he would; but their own dialect was 
more grateful, as well as more familiar, to their ear. An 
illustration of this bilingual characteristic so common at that 
time, is presented in Luke’s account of the preaching of 
Paul and Barnabas at Lystra, a town of Lycaonia in Asia 
Minor.* A miracle wrought by Paul had such an effect 
upon the people, that they took him and his companion for 
gods who had come down in the form of men, identifying 
Barnabas with Jupiter, and Paul, as the principal speaker, 


1 Greca leguntur in omnibus fere gentibus, Latina suis finibus, exi- 
guis sane, continentur.—Pro Arcu., 10. 


2Mommsen, Hist. of Rome, iv. 641. *Actsxxii.2. * Acts xiv. 8-19. 


SPREAD OF THE GREEK LANGUAGE, 59 


with Mercury. In their excitement, they called out in 
their own dialect—“ in the speech of Lycaonia ’’—that the 
gods were with them, and forthwith made ready to pay 
them divine honors. Paul and his associate had not at 
first perceived what they would do,—not understanding 
their language; but as soon as the Apostles found out what 
was intended, they repelled the design with warmth. The 
discourse of the Apostles had been in Greek, which was 
pertectly intelligible to their auditors; but these, when 
moved with strong emotion, fell back upon their vernacu- 
lar, which Paul and Barnabas did not comprehend. Had 
the Lycaonians not been familiar with Greek, the mes- 
sengers of the Gospel could not have preached to them. 
But for the diffusion of the Greek language generally, 
they would have been stopped everywhere by a like insu- 
perable barrier. Under this check, the new religion, ex- 
posed as it was to hostility on the right hand and left, 
might not have lived long enough to take root. Perse- 
cuted in one city, its preachers could flee to another; and 
they were possessed, wherever they went, of a ready 
vehicle of communication with the people. Greek may 
be said to be the language of the primitive Church, at 
least beyond the bounds of Palestine. The earliest Chris- 
tian worship at Rome was in that tongue. It was the 
medium for the expression of Christian thought, the lan- 
guage of theology in the first age of Christianity, in the 
West as well as East. Of the wide-spread influence of the 
Greek language and culture, Dollinger writes: ‘‘The sway 
of Greek customs, of the Hellenic tongue, maintained and 
extended itself continually, from the Euphrates to the 
Adriatic. Like a mighty stream, rushing forward in 
every direction, Hellenism had there overspread all things. 
Even in remote Bactria, as far as the banks of the 
Indus, Greek was understood. Greek culture held its 


60 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


ground as late as the first centuries after Christ. Parthian 
kings had the dramas of Euripides enacted before them. 
Greek rhetoric and philosophy, the Hellenic predilection 
for public speeches, discussions, and lectures, prevailed 
through the Asiatic cities.” ἢ 

In the Roman dominions west of the Adriatic, the Latin 
had a corresponding prevalence. Gaul, conquered by 
Julius Cesar, rapidly experienced the influence of the lan- 
guage and civilization of Rome. The same effect followed 
in Spain, and, in a greater or less degree, in all the other 
provinces of the West. Speaking of the age of the An- 
tonines, Gibbon says: “ The language of Virgil and Cicero, 
though with some inevitable mixture of corruption, was so 
universally adopted in Africa, Spain, Gaul, Britain, and 
Pannonia, that the faint traces of the Punic or Celtic 
idioms were present only in the mountains or among the 
peasants.” As regards Britain only, the statement needs 
to be essentially curtailed ; respecting the other countries 
named, it is well sustained by proof. Nor was the influ- 
ence of the Latin restricted to the Occident. Roman mag- 
istrates, wherever they were, promulgated their laws and 
decrees in their own tongue. It was the language of courts 
and of the camp. In the year 88 B.c., by the order of 
Mithridates, all the Romans in the cities of Asia were 
massacred in a single day. The number was at least forty 
thousand ; it is made twice as large by two of the ancient 
writers, and Plutarch’s statement is one hundred and fifty 
thousand. The Romans who, at all times, were found in 
so great numbers in the countries of the East, on errands 
of business, war, or pleasure, made the Latin familiar to 
numerous natives of those regions. 

4. We have to notice briefly the means and motives of 
intercourse between the inhabitants of the Empire. Fried- 


* Heidenthum u. Judenthum, p. 33. ? Vol.i., p. 174, (Smith’s ed.) 


TRAVEL AND INTERCOURSE. 61 


lander, in his learned discussion of this topic,’ has pointed 
out that at no time down to the beginning of the present 
century, has it been possible to make journeys with so 
much ease, safety, and rapidity, as in the first centuries of 
the imperial era. The motives and occasions of travel 
were quite as various then as now. The Empire brought 
peace to the world. It was a new condition of mankind. 
The constant employment of nations had been war. The 
ancient writers dwell with rapture upon the reign of tran- 
quillity which now prevailed. The security of the traveller 
and the facility of intercourse are a common theme of con- 
gratulation in writers from one end of the Empire to the 
other. The majesty of Rome, as Pliny proudly declares, 
was the shield of the wayfarer in every place. Epictetus, 
and the Alexandrian Philo are especially fervid in their 
remarks on this subject.” They dilate on the busy ap- 
pearance of the ports and marts. ‘Cesar,’ writes the 
Stoic philosopher, “has procured us a profound peace; 
there are neither wars, nor battles, nor great robberies, nor 
piracies ; but we may travel at all hours, and sail from 
east to west.”* The vast territory subject to Rome was 
covered with a net-work of magnificent roads, which 
moved in straight lines, crossing mountains and bridging 
rivers, binding together the most remote cities, and con- 
necting them all with the capital. The deep ruts, worn 
in the hard basaltic pavement, and still visible even in 
places far from the metropolis, show to what extent they 
were used. Five main lines went out from Rome to the 
extremities of the Empire. These, with their branches 
running in whatever direction public convenience required, 
were connected at the sea-ports with the routes of mari- 
time travel. A journey might have been made upon 


1 Sittengeschichte Roms., ii. 1 seq. (3d ed.) 
7See the references in Friedliinder, ii. 4. 3 Diss., iii. 13. 9. 


62 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Roman highways, interrupted only by brief trips upon the 
sea, from Alexandria to Carthage, thence through Spain 
and France, and northward to the Scottish border; then 
back through Leyden, Cologne, Milan, eastward by land 
to Constantinople and Antioch, and thence to Alexandria ; 
and the distance traversed would have exceeded 7,000 
miles. The traveller could measure his progress by the 
mile-stones along all these roads ; and maps of the route, 
giving distances from place to place, with stopping-places 
for the night, facilitated his journey. Augustus established 
a system of postal conveyances, which were used by officers, 
couriers, and other agents of the government; but private 
enterprise provided similar means of travel for the public 
generally. In the principal streets of large cities carriages 
could be hired, and one could arrange for making a journey, 
in Italy at least, by a method resembling the modern post, 
or vetturino. 

The fact that so extensive territories were united under 
one government gave rise to a great deal of journeying from 
one part to another. Magistrates, and official persons of 
every sort, were travelling to and from their posts. There 
were frequent embassies from the provinces to Rome. 
Large bodies of troops were transferred from place to place, 
and thus became acquainted with regions remote from their 
homes. A stream of travel flowed from all directions to 
the capital ; but there was also a lively intercourse between 
the several provinces. “ Greek scholars,” says Friedlinder, 
“kept school in Spain; the women of a Roman colony in 
Switzerland employed a goldsmith from Asia Minor; in 
the cities of Gaul were Greek painters and sculptors ; 
Gauls and Germans served as body-guards of a Jewish king 
at Jerusalem ; Jews were settled inall the provinces.” The 
Empire gave a new impetus to commerce. There was 
everywhere one system of law, free-trade with the capital, 


INTERCOURSE BY COMMERCE. 63 


and uniformity in coins, measures, and weights. In the 
reign of Claudius, an embassy came to Rome from a 
prince of the island of Ceylon, who had been struck with 
admiration for the Romans by finding that the denarii, 
though stamped with the images of different Emperors, 
were of just the same weight. In ancient times, mercantile 
transactions could not, as now, be carried forward by cor- 
respondence. Hence, merchants were commonly travellers, 
visiting foreign markets, and negotiating with foreign pro- 
ducers and dealers, in person. Horace frequently refers to 
the unsettled, rambling life characteristic of merchants. 
Pliny describes them as found in a throng upon every ac- 
cessible sea. In an epitaph of a Phrygian merchant, acci- 
dentally preserved, he is made to boast of having sailed to 
Italy, round Cape Malea, seventy-two times. 

The pirates, who, before the time of Pompey and Cesar, 
had rendered navigation so perilous, had been swept from 
the Mediterranean. The annexation of Egypt enabled 
Augustus to establish a new route of commerce with the 
Hast, by the way of the Nile and the Arabian gulf. Ro- 
man merchants visited every land. They had their ports 
for trade in Britain, and on the coast of Ireland, They 
brought amber, in the first century, from the shores of the 
Baltic. They went with their caravans and vessels to 
Ethiopia and India. The increase of luxury in the capital 
stimulated trade. Whatever could gratify the palate was 
brought from all quarters to the markets of Rome; and 
the same was true of the multiform products of art and 
mechanical skill. 

In the Book of Revelation, where Rome is designated as 
Babylon, her imports are thus enumerated : “ The merchan- 
dise of gold, and silver, and precious stones, and of pearls, 
and fine linen, and purple and silk, and scarlet, and all 
thyine wood, and all manner vessels of ivory, and all man- 


64 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


ner vessels of most precious wood, and of brass and iron, 
and marble, and cinnamon, and odors, and ointments, and 
frankincense, and wine, and oil, and fine flour, and wheat, 
and beasts, and sheep, and horses, and chariots, and slaves, 
and souls of men ”’ (Rev. xviii. 12-14). Except in winter, 
when the ancients laid up their ships, the sea was alive with 
vessels, transporting to Rome the precious metals from the 
mines of Spain, wild animals for the arena from Africa, 
the wines of Greece, the woollens of Asia Minor, the gums, 
and silks, and diamonds, of the East. The great corn fleet 
from Egypt was met at Puteoli by a deputation of Senators, 
and greeted with public demonstrations of joy. 

Journeys from scientific curiosity were not at all unfre- 
quent. Men visited distant countries in quest of knowledge. 
Each province had seats of education to which young men 
resorted. To Rome, Alexandria, and Athens, students came 
from all parts of the world. In Rome, and Athens, chairs 
of instruction were established by the State, and thus, like 
Constantinople afterwards, they had what resembled modern 
universities. Rhetorical teachers were accustomed to jour- 
ney from city to city. To the more successful of them 
statues were erected by their admiring pupils, or by the 
municipal authorities, in the various places where they had 
sojourned. Artists, and manufacturers of artistic works of 
every kind, led a wandering life. They plied their voca- 
tion for a time in one city, and then transplanted themselves 
to another. They might be summoned from remote com- 
munities for some task of peculiar magnitude, or requiring 
extraordinary skill. If this class of persons were migratory 
in their habit, much more was this true in the case of act- 
ors, musicians, athletes, and purveyors of amusement of 
every description. When we consider how universal was 
the taste for art and artistic decoration, and how insatiable 
the craving for popular entertainments, we can judge how 


MOTIVES OF TRAVEL. 65 


numerous were the itinerants whose business it was to mi- 
nister to these demands. Great public festivals, like the 
Pythian games, drew together a countless throng of specta- 
tors. Religious ceremonies, like those of the Eleusinian 
mysteries, had a like attractive power. Religious pilgrim- 
ages are not a peculiar feature of Christian society. Such 
visits were not uncommon to the shrines of heathenism. 
Invalids, in those days as at present, either of their own 
motion, or by the advice of physicians, undertook journeys 
by land and upon the sea, for the restoration of health, 
Then tourists who visited different countries, from a cu- 
riosity to see strange lands, and to inspect places of histori- 
cal renown, were scarcely less numerous then than now. 
Egypt and its antiquities had a peculiar fascination for the 
Romans,—the same fascination that Rome and its monu- 
ments now have for us. Men journeyed from afar to be- 
hold the stupendous edifices upon the Nile. Grecian his- 
tory, too, had a profound interest for the Romans. To 
them it belonged to a glorious past, and they resorted with 
reverence and delight to the spots made famous by Hellenic 
wisdom and valor.t In speaking of the means of social in- 
tercourse, we should not omit to mention the great water- 
ing-places,—places of fashionable resort, like Bais, where 
multitudes were collected at the proper season, and which 
were centres of gaiety, dissipation, and political intrigue, 
In tracing the causes that produced a mingling of man- 
1 It is a curious fact that the relish for wild and romantic scenery, 
especially mountainous scenery, is of recent origin. It seldom appears in 
the literature of antiquity, or of the middle ages. It is not until the 
eighteenth century that this taste manifests itself to any considerable de- 
gree. The changed feeling, as contrasted with times previous, on this 
subject, may almost be said to date from Rousseau. Ruskin has called 
attention to the remarkable difference between modern and ancient feel- 


ing in this particular. The topic is fully treated by Friedlinder, ii. 204 


seq. (3d ed.). But as to Homer, see Shairp, On Poetic Interpret. of Nar 
ture, p. 143. 
δ 


66 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


kind, we find that the terrible scourges, war and slavery, 
played a conspicuous part. The Roman Empire had been 
built up by incessant wars. In war, men of different races 
met, though it were for the purpose of mutual destruction. 
They crossed their own boundaries, and gained a better 
knowledge of each other. Armies were captured and sur- 
rendered, towns occupied by a conquering force. In like 
manner, slavery as it existed in the ancient world, leading 
as it often did, to the deportation of thousands of people at 
once from their homes to a new and, perhaps, distant abode, 
contributed to the same result. The hostility and cruelty 
of men were overruled by Providence, and made the occa- 
sion of a certain benefit. 

We have stated that the Roman policy was to break up 
nationalities. In the case of the Jews all efforts in this 
direction proved futile. They maintained their separation 
of race, and held together in an unbroken unity. 

There were three nations of antiquity, each of which was 
entrusted with a grand providential office in reference to 
Christianity. The Greeks, whatever they may have learned 
from Babylon, Egypt, and Tyre, excelled all other races in 
a self-expanding power of intellect—in “the power of 
lighting their own fire.” They are the masters in science, 
literature, and art. Plato, speaking of his own countrymen, 
made “the love of knowledge” the special characteristic 
of “our part of the world,” as the love of money was 
attributed with equal truth to the Phcenicians and Egyp- 
tians! The robust character of the Romans, and their 
sense of right, qualified them to rule, and to originate and 
transmit their great system of law, and their methods of 
political organization. Virgil lets Anchises define the fune- 
tion of the Roman people, in his address to Auneas, a visitor 
to the abodes of the dead :— 


1 Republic, iv. 485 (Jowett, 11. 265.) 


DISPERSION OF THE JEWS. 67 


“Others, I know, more tenderly may beat the breathing brass, 
And better from the marble block bring living looks to pass; 
Others may better plead the cause, may compass heayven’s face, 
And mark it out, and tell the stars, their rising and their place: 
But thou, O Roman, look to it the folks of earth to sway; 
For this shall be thine handicraft, peace on the world to lay, 
To spare the weak, to mar the proud by constant weight of war.” 1 


Greece and Rome had each its own place to fill ; but true 
religion—the spirit in which man should live—comes from 
the Hebrews. 

The remarkable fact which we have to notice, respecting 
the Hebrews, is their dispersion over the world at the epoch 
of the birth of Christ.” Among those who listened to the 
Apostles on the day of Pentecost, at Jerusalem, were Jews 
“out of every nation under heaven”—Parthians, and Medes, 
and Elamites, and dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judea 
and in Cappadocia, in Pontus and Asia, Phrygia, and Pam- 
phylia, Egypt, Cyrene, Crete, Arabia, and Rome. Jo- 
sephus says that there is no country on earth where Jews 
do not make up a part of the population. In Strabo we 
find almost the same assertion. In Babylon and the neigh- 
boring region a multitude of them had remained after the 
close of the captivity; and, according to the Jewish histo- 
rian, they were numbered there by tens of thousands. A 
colony of them had been planted at Alexandria by its 
founder; and there they became so numerous as to occupy 
two out of the five sections of the city, but were not con- 


* Excudent alii sperantia mollius era, 
Credo equidem: vivos ducent de marmore vultus ; 
Orabunt causas melits; ccelique meatus 
Describent radio, et surgentia sidera dicent: 
Tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento: 
Hac tibi erunt artes; pacique imponere morem, 
Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos.— En. vi. 847-853. 


? See Winer, Realwérterbuch, Art. Zeitrechnung. 
5 Acts ii. 5-12. * Bell. Jud., vii. 83; Ant., xiv. 7, 2. 


68 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


fined to these quarters. They were governed by magistrates 
of their own; and while, in common with Jews every where, 
they kept up a connection with the sanctuary at Jerusalem, 
they not only reared synagogues, but had also a temple of 
their own at Leontopolis. In Egypt, in the first century 
of our era, there were not less than a million of Jews, con- 
stituting an eighth part of the population of the country. 
In the flourishing city of Cyrene they formed a large por- 
tion of the inhabitants. Nowhere, outside of Palestine, 
was the Jewish population more numerous than in Syria 
and Asia Minor. At Antioch they constituted a powerful 
body, and enjoyed there privileges analogous to those of 
their brethren at Alexandria. From Syria, they passed 
over into Asia Minor, forming settlements in all the prin- 
cipal towns. Besides the natural emigration from Syria, 
Antiochus the Great had transplanted to that region two 
thousand Jewish families from Mesopotamia. Among other 
places, Ephesus and Tarsus were noted seats of Jewish com- 
munities. In Crete, Cyprus, and other islands, there were 
synagogues crowded with worshippers. From Asia the 
Jews had found their way into the cities of Macedonia and 
Greece. Athens, Corinth, Thessalonica, Philippi, are among 
the places where were Jewish settlements. Jews were found 
in Illyricum, and early penetrated to the northern coasts of 
the Black Sea. The Jewish prisoners brought by Pompey 
to Rome, afterwards received their freedom. The district 
across the Tiber was principally occupied by them. An 
embassy of Herod to Augustus is said to have been accom- 
panied by eight thousand Jewish residents of Rome. Among 
other towns of Italy, Caprea, and especially Puteoli, are 
known to have had a Jewish population. Apart from per- 
manent residents of Hebrew extraction, Jewish merchants 
made their way to every place in the Roman Empire where 
there was any hope of profit from trade. Thus the Pales- 


SPREAD OF JUDAISM. 69 


tinian community, though still the religious centre of all 
the Jews, comprised within its limits only a portion of this 
ubiquitous nation. Capable of making a home for himself 
anywhere, the Jew was specially adapted to the state 
“‘ which was to be built on the ruins of a hundred living 
polities.” “In the ancient world, also, Judaism was an 
effective leaven of cosmopolitanism and national decompo- 
sition; and to that extent specially entitled to membership 
in the Cexsarian State, the polity of which was really noth- 
ing but a citizenship of the world, and the nationality of 
which was really nothing but humanity.”* Julius Cesar, 
like Alexander before him, granted to the Jewsspecial favors. 
Especially was this the case at Alexandriaand Rome. Yet 
the Jews throughout the West were regarded with a peculiar 
antipathy. In Egypt, they were always objects of a national 
animosity. By the Roman writers, in particular after the 
stubborn and bloody insurrections in which the Jews en- 
deavored to gain their freedom, they were spoken of with 
abhorrence. Their steadfast assertion that they alone were 
possessed of the true religion, excited both hatred and con- 
tempt from those who could see nothing in such a claim 
but the spirit of arrogance and intolerance. ‘ Whatever,” 
says Tacitus, “is held sacred by the Romans, with the Jews 
is profane; and what in other nations is unlawful and im- 
pure, with them is permitted.”? Nevertheless, the Jews 
succeeded in making proselytes to their faith and worship 
to such an extent as to call out the sarcastic animadversion 
of Roman satirists, and to elicit from Seneca the complaint 
that “the conquered had given laws to the conquerors: ” 
Victi victoribus leges dederunt.? Wherever they went, they 
carried a pure monotheism which neither bribes nor torture 
could move them to surrender, and which led them to spurn 


1 Mommeen, iv. 648. ? Hist. v. 4. 
5 Ap. Augustine, de civ. Dei, vi. 11. 


70 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


with loathing all participation in the rites of heathenism. 
As the first preachers of Christianity went from city to city, 
it was in the synagogues that they first gained a hearing, 
and found a starting-point for their labors. There the law 
and the prophets were read on every Sabbath; and there 
would be found assemblies capable of apprehending, even 
if disinclined to believe, the proclamation of Jesus as the 
predicted Messiah. 

5. What was the effect of the union and commingling 
of nations upon the heathen religions? The consideration 
of the general state of religion in the Roman Empire is 
reserved for subsequent pages. We advert here toa single 
circumstance,—the effect which must have resulted, and 
which, as history tells us, did result from the combination 
of so many nations under one sovereignty. ‘There had 
existed a multiplicity of local religions. The gods of each 
people, it was believed, had ordained the method of their 
worship within the bounds of the territory over which they 
stood as guardians. National divinities were treated with 
respect by the Romans, and the diversified systems of wor- 
ship were left untouched as long as they kept within their own 
limits. ‘This was the extent of Roman toleration. For 
Roman citizens to bring in new divinities, or foreign rites 
of worship, was both repugnant to the laws, and abhorrent 
to conservative Roman feeling. Cicero, with all his lib- 
erality of sentiment, advocates, in his book of “the Laws,” 
the suppression, among the Roman people themselves, of 
all departures from the legally established cultus.’ Loyalty 
to the state involved a strict adherence to the state-religion. 
But polytheism could find room in its Pantheon for an in- 
definite number of deities. In early times, when the 
Romans attacked a foreign tribe, or city, they were at pains 
to invite in solemn form the local divinities to abandon 


1 De Legibus, B. 11. 


THE MINGLING OF RELIGIONS. 11 


the place where they were worshipped, and to transfer 
their abode to Rome. What must have been the effect 
upon the conquered nations of the inability or unwilling- 
ness of their ancestral gods to defend their own temples 
and worshippers? It is hardly possible that a shock should 
not have been given, in many instances, to the faith and 
devotion which experienced so terrible a disappointment. 
But our main inquiry here relates to the effect upon the 
minds of men of a familiar acquaintance with so great a 
variety of dissimilar religions. As regards a certain class, 
the tendency unquestionably was to engender skepticism. 
Lucian may stand as a representative of this class. In one 
of his diverting dialogues,' he represents Jupiter as pale 
and anxious on account of a debate which had sprung up 
on earth between Damis, an Epicurean Atheist, and Ti- 
mocles, who maintained that there are gods and a provi- 
dence. To avert a common danger all the divinities were 
summoned to a council. They came in a throng, those 
with names, and those without a name, from Egypt, and 
Syria, Persia, and Thrace, and every country under the 
sun. Mercury, to whom it belonged to seat them, could 
not quell their wrangles for precedence, and Jupiter ordered 
them to be seated promiscuously until a council could be 
convoked to determine their rank. While the debate goes 
on below between Damis and Timocles, the gods tremble 
with anxiety lest their champion should be worsted, and 
they should lose, as a consequence, their offerings and 
honors. Timocles appeals to the universal belief in the 
gods. ‘Thank you,” rejoins Damis, “ for putting me in 
mind of the laws and manners of nations, which sufficiently 
show how uncertain everything is which relates to their 
gods ; it is nothing but error and confusion. Some wor- 
ship one, and some another. The Scythians sacrifice to a 


* Jupiter Tragoedus. 


72 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


scimetar ; the Thracians to Zamolxis, who came to them, 
a fugitive from Samos; the Phrygians to Mine [the moon]; 
the Cyllenians to Phales; the Assyrians to a Dove; the 
Persians to Fire; the Egyptians to Water.” Then the 
special sorts of Egyptian worship, all differing from each 
other, are enumerated ; and Damis concludes his lively 
speech with the exclamation: “ How ridiculous, my good 
Timocles, is such variety!” It would be an error to con- 
clude that the spirit of this passage, and of other passages 
in Lucian of like tenor, prevailed among his contempora- 
ries. Yet it is obvious that he did not stand alone. All 
these religions must have seemed to many a confused jum- 
ble, and have moved some to reject all in common, if not 
to disbelieve in anything divine. 

Another large class were tempted to forsake, in a degree 
at least, their traditional creed and worship, and to espouse 
another,—it might be some older religion from the East, 
which came clothed with the fascination of mystery. 

A tendency to syncretism—to a mingling of heteroge- 
neous religions—was a notable characteristic of the age 
contemporaneous with the introduction of Christianity. 
Men of a philosophical turn, in whom reverence for re- 
ligion was still strong, sought to combine in a catholic sys- 
tem, and in harmonious unity, the apparently discordant 
creeds of heathenism. Plutarch is a conspicuous example 
of this tendency. The effort, futile as it proved, was one 
of the signs of the times, and was owing largely to the 
commingling of nations, and of the multiform religions 
which had divided the homage of mankind. An escape 
was sought from the distracting influence of polytheism, by 
an identification of divinities bearing different names, and 
by connecting a conception of the divine unity with the ad- 
mission of multitudinous deities with subordinate functions, 

Old beliefs were dissolving, at least were assuming new 


THE IDEA OF HUMANITY. io 


forms, in the ferment of the Roman world. But the hope 
that there could be one religion for all mankind was 
deemed visionary. Celsus, the noted opponent of Chris- 
tianity in the second century, thought that it might bea 
good thing “if all the inhabitants of Asia, Europe, and 
Lybia, Greeks and barbarians, all to the uttermost ends of 
the earth ” were to come under one religious system ; but, 
he says, “any one who thinks this possible knows nothing.” ! 
An expectation of this sort struck him as utterly chimerical. 
The Emperor Julian who dreamed of restoring paganism 
from its fall could not consider it natural or possible for the 
different nations to have a common religion. Their diver- 
sities were too radical. The Roman Empire did muck to pre- 
pare the way for a universal religion ; but such a religion it 
had no power to create from the materials of polytheism. 

The idea of a common humanity, far as it was from at- 
taining the force of a practical conviction, capable of neu- 
tralizing deeply-rooted prejudices of an opposite nature, 
was obscurely present in the minds even of men unused to 
philosophic speculation. The line of Terence, 

“Homo sum: humani nihil a me alienum puto,”’— 

“Tam aman; nothing that affects man is indifferent to me” 
—-signified, in the connection where it occurs, that the cala- 
mities which afflict one man should interest all.? “ One 
touch of nature makes the whole world kin.” A Roman 
theatre, filled though it was with an ignorant rabble, when 
that line was heard, rang with applause.* 

1 Origenes 6. Celsum, viil. 72. 

2 Heaut. Act i. Se. i. 25. On the use made of this passage by Cicero, and 
other ancient and modern writers, see Parry, P. Terentii Comedic, p. 174. 
“T think, articulate, I laugh and weep, 

And exercise all functions of a man. 
How then should [ and any man that lives 


Be strangers to each other?” 
3 Augustine, Zp., 52. —CowPer, The Task. (The Garden.) 


74 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER III. 
THE POPULAR RELIGION OF THE GREEKS AND ROMANS. 


THE heathen religions did not spring out of a mere 
scientific curiosity which, in its rude beginning, can give 
no better account of the world than to attribute it to a 
multitude of personal agents. No explanation of the origin 
of heathenism is adequate, which fails to recognize the re- 
ligious factor,—-the sense of the supernatural, the feelings 
of dependence and accountableness, and that yearning for a 
higher communion which is native to the soul. ‘These in- 
nate sentiments lie at the root of religion, even in its 
cruder forms. ‘I consider it impossible ’—writes one of 
the most genial and profound of scholars—“ that that all- 
comprehending and all-pervading belief in the divine essence, 
which we find in the earliest times among the Greeks, as 
well as other nations, can be deduced in a convincing man- 
ner from sensible impressions, and conclusions built 
thereon ; and I am of opinion, that the historian must here 
rest satisfied with pre-supposing that the assumption of a 
hyper-physical living world and nature, which lay at the 
bottom of every phenomenon, was natural and necessary to 
the mind of man, richly endowed by nature.’* ‘This na- 
tive faith was determined as to the particular forms 
it should assume, by the nature and circumstances of in- 
dividual nations and tribes: hence the various modes of 
religion. Under the prompting of this latent belief, the 


‘K. O. Miller, Proleg. zu einer wissenschaftl. Myth., Leitch’s Eng- 
lish Transl., p. 176. 


CHARACTER OF THE ANCIENT RELIGIONS. 75 


personifying imagination, so rife in the childhood of man- 
kind, endues all the separate parts of nature with personal 
life and agency.’ The various beings thus created by 
fancy discharge the functions attributed by science after- 
wards to material and mental forces.2 To them the phe- 
nomena of nature without, and to a considerable extent, 
of the mind within, as well as the course of events in the 
world, are relegated, each of them being in charge of his 
particular province. The classic religions had risen above 
that simpler stage, where the god is shut up to the special 
natural operation which it belongs to him in particular to 
falfil. The deities of Greece and Rome are anthropomorphic 
beings, still performing, each in his place, the various 
offices in the movement of nature and of human affairs, 
which they had been—so to speak—called into being to 
execute; but they are no longer limited to these specialties. 
They constitute a society, and enjoy a wider range of ac- 
tivity. Poseidon (Neptune), in addition to the management 
of the seas, takes part, as a member of the Olympian 
Council, in the administration of the world’s affairs. It is 
the middle stage of religion, where the divinity is not yet 
set free from the bonds of nature, distinguished from 
natural agencies, and elevated above them. ‘This progress 
has begun, but is only partially accomplished. 

But the minds of men demanded more in the object of 
worship than the imagination could impart. ‘The ten- 
dency to individualize, and the endeavor to comprehend 
the universality of Deity,” blindly struggled with each 
other. Hence the conflict of higher and lower conceptions 


*Upon the process of the development of myths, andthe agency oflan- 
guage in connection with it, see Max Miiller’s Chips from a German Work- 
shop, Vol. ii. 

? Upon the impossibility of monotheism in the ancient worship of 
Greece, in connection with the prevalent notions of the external world, 
see K. O. Miller, p. 184. 


76 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


—in the case of Zeus, for example—and that undercurrent 
in the direction of unity, which marks the history of the 
Greek religion." 

We shall have to notice three phases in the development 
of the Greek popular religion—the Homeric faith; that 
system as altered and ennobled in the age of the tragic 
poets, when Greek life was at its highest point of vigor, and 
the later era of decline and dissolution. We begin with 
the Homeric theology. 

1. The nature of the gods and their relation to the world. 
The gods in Homer are human beings with greatly 
magnified powers. They are males and females, each class 
having the characteristics of the corresponding sex among 
men. Their dwelling is in the sky above us, and their 
abode on the top of Mt. Olympus.?_ They have bodies like 
those of men, but their veins, in the room of blood, are 
filled with a celestial ichor. In size they do not, generally 
speaking, surpass the human measure, but sometimes they 
are spoken of as gigantic. When Ares (Mars) (Il. xxi. 407) 
is struck down upon the field of Troy, he stretches over 
seven plethrums (nearly two acres) of ground. They ex- 
perience hunger, but feast upon ambrosia and nectar. They 
are overcome with sleep. They acquire knowledge through 
the senses, which are of vastly augmented power. Hence 
they must be present where their power is to be exerted. 
This, however, does not hold true of influences upon the 
mind; but it is true of all external, visible doings, with the 
exception of a few instances in the case of Zeus. The 
ery of Ares and of Poseidon when they are wounded, is 
like that of nine or ten thousand men (Il. v. 860; x. 14, 

1See Miiller, p. 184, and compare Nigelsbach, Hom. Theol. Ὁ. 11, seq., 
with the criticism upon the views of B. Constant in his work, De la 
Religion, iii. 327 seq. 

2 On the distinction between the Iliad and Odyssey as to the abode of 
the gods, see Prof. Ihne, in Smith’s Dict. of Biog. and Myth., i. p. 510. 


THE NATURE OF THE GODS. as 


148). The eye, and ear, and the other corporeal organs 
have a like strength as compared with man. The deities 
travel with miraculous swiftness. Hera flies from Mount 
Ida to Olympus as swiftly as thought. But some physical 
instrumentality is frequently introduced, as when Athena 
puts on her beautiful sandals in preparation for her jour- 
neys. The divinities mingle in battle with men. They 
cohabit with human beings, and heroes are the offspring. 
Thetis was obliged to defer presenting the complaint of 
Achilles to Zeus, on account of his absence from home on 
a visit, of twelve days duration, among the Ethiopians. 
With regard to the mental and spiritual faculties of the 
gods, there is the same unsuccessful, inconsistent effort to 
liberate them from the limitations of humanity. Their 
boundless knowledge and power are asserted in terms, but 
their title to these high attributes is not at all sustained by 
what is narrated of them. Even Zeus is the victim of a 
trick of Hera, and is kept in ignorance of what is taking 
place before the Trojan walls. It was only after the event 
that Poseidon had knowledge of the blinding of Cyclops 
by Ulysses. As to their power, they are the creators neither 
of nature, nor of men. They can hasten or retard the 
processes of nature; they can heal diseases by a miracle ; 
they can transform the physical shape of men. Ulysses is 
changed by Athena into an old and shrivelled beggar, and 
restored back again to himself. Moreover, they can give life 
to things inanimate; golden statues, ‘‘ with firm gait,” 
order the steps of Hephestus.' They can give immor- 
tality to whomsoever they desire. The ease and blessedness 
of the dwellers upon Olympus are celebrated. Yet this 
bliss is far from being perfect. To Aphrodite, wounded 
and distressed, Dione says : 


1 Τ|, xviii. 417-421. 


78 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


— “Submit, my daughter, and endure, 
Though inly grieved; for many of us who dwell 
Upon the Olympian mount have suffered much 
From mortals, and have brought great miseries 
Upon each other.” * 


The goddess proceeds to tell of Ares, who was chained 
up for thirteen months in a cell, and who became withered 
and weak from long confinement; and of the anguish of 
Hera, and of Pluto, when they were pierced with arrows. 
If we look at the moral conduct of the Homeric divinities, 
we find it rather below than above that of the heroes who 
figure in their company. They resort to treachery and 
deceit to compass their ends. Zeus sends a false dream to 
Agamemnon, in order to effect a slaughter of the Greeks. 
Athena incites the Trojans to break their truce, to furnish 
an occasion for their own destruction; and she is sent on 
this malignant errand by Zeus, who, in turn, is instigated 
by the pleas of Hera. Athena, assuming the form and 
voice of Deiphobus, gives to Hector a deceitful promise of 
assistance, for the purpose of betraying him to death. 
Ulysses, lying in ambush by night, and finding himself 
cold, assumes that some god has misled him into leaving 
his cloak behind in the camp. It is needless to refer to 
examples of cruelty and sensuality on the part of the Ηο- 
meric divinities. They are painted as the authors of evil, 
as well as of good. Hera and Athena never forgave the 
judgment of Paris in favor of Aphrodite, and pursued the 
Trojans with implacable wrath. The deities are capable 
of being appeased in individual instances; but as they act 
in this matter on no fixed principles, they may show them- 
selves utterly implacable. 

1 πέτλαθι, τέκνον ἐμόν, καὶ ἀνάσχεο, κηδομένη περ. 
Πολλοὶ γὰρ δὴ τλῆμεν ᾿Ολύμπια δώματ᾽ ἔχοντες 
Ἔξ ἀνδρῶν χαλέπ’ ἄλγε᾽ ἐπ' ἄλλήλοισ: τιθέντες. 
Il. v. 382-384 (Bryant, ν. 472-476). 


AGENCY OF THE GODS. 79 


The prime distinction of the gods is their exemption 
from death. They are immortal. But for this they are 
dependent on bodily sustenance. There 15 ἃ virtue in their 
food which avails to keep them alive. The very words 
“ambrosia and nectar” signify this. These, infused into 
the body of Patroclus, keep it from decay; ‘‘a rosy and 
ambrosial oil” saved the corpse of Hector from being torn, 
when it was dragged along the earth. The gods have a 
birth and beginning; but they are lifted above the lot of 
men by the one distinction of being immortal. 

The gods are the guides and rulers of nations. Their 
interposition is potent, their protection and aid are indis- 
pensable. But they act in this capacity according to no 
wise and continuous plan. Caprice and personal favor 
play a principal part in their proceedings, The depend- 
ence of the individual upon the gods is entire. All physi- 
cal and mental advantages are their gift. As Polydamas 
reminds Hector: 


— “On one the god bestows 
Prowess in war, upon another grace 
In dance, upon another skill to touch 
The harp and sing. In yet another, Jove 
The Thunderer implants the prudent mind, 
By which the many profit, and by which 
Communities are saved,” ! 


Ulysses reminds Laodamas that the gods make one man 
comely in person, but may deny to him the gift of genius 
and eloquence which they bestow upon another less beau- 
tiful. Two caskets of gifts, one full of good things, and 


1 ἄλλῳ μὲν yap ἔδωκε θεὸς πολεμῆια ἔργα" 
[ἄλλῳ δ΄’ ὀρχηστύν, ἐτέρῳ κίθαριν καί ἀοιδὴν" ] 
ἄλλῳ δ᾽ ἐν στήθεσσι τίθει νόον ἑυρύοπα Ζεὺς 
ἐσθλόν, τοῦ δέ τε πολλοὶ ἐπαυρίσκοντ᾽ ἄνθρωποι" 
καί Te πολέας ἐσάωσε, μάλιστα δέ kK’ αὐτὸς ἀνέγνω. 


Il. xiii. 729-734 (Bryant xiii. 913-927). 


80 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the other of evil, stand by the threshold of Zeus: out of 
these the lot of men is made up. It is some god that 
makes Achilles brave. Athena inspires Diomede with valor. 
Zeus sends panic fear into the soul of Hector. Athena be- 
reaves the Trojans of reason, that they may choose to fight 
in the open plain instead of behind their walls. The wis- 
dom of the wise, the courage of the brave, felicity in do- 
mestic relations, safety and prosperity on the land and the 
sea, flow from the favor of the gods; and so infirmities and 
calamities of every sort are equally due to them. ‘There is 
no devil in the Homeric system; no one being who plans 
and executes evil exclusively. The idea of such agents 
falls into a later period in the development of Greek reli- 
gion. Hence, in Homer, evil suggestions and doings are 
credited to the gods generally. The functions of the Temp- 
ter and Adversary reside in them. They mislead, seduce, 
contrive mischief, prompt to crime. So far as evil pur- 
poses and proceedings are felt to be of preternatural origin, 
they are traced to Zeus and his associates. A deity is said 
to have prompted Helen to the foul wrong which led to 
the war of Troy (Od. iv. 339-3438). 

The general doctrine as to the administration of the 
world is expressed in the lines: 


—— “The great gods are never pleased 
With violent deeds; they honor equity 
And justice.” * 


But the exceptions to this rule on the pages of Homer 
are quite as numerous as the examples. The actual govern- 
ment of Olympus was marked by the same sort of injustice, 
oppression and partiality which were mingled in the con- 
duct of human rulers towards their subjects. 


1 ob μὲν σχέτλια ἔργα θεοὶ μάκαρες φιλέουσιν, 
ἀλλὰ δίκην τίουσι καὶ αἴσιμα ἔργ᾽ ἀνθρώπων. 


Od. xiv. 88, 84 (Bryant xiv. 100-102). 


THE OLYMPIAN FAMILY. 81 


2. The relation of the gods to each other. Zeus sits as 
a King in the midst of his Council. They are not mere 
instruments of the Supreme Ruler. Posidon allows to his 
brother only a patriarchal supremacy, not an absolute, de- 
spotic rule. Like a family, the gods consult and debate 
on the summit of Olympus, where 
“The calm ether is without a cloud ; 


And in the golden light that lies on all, 
Day after day the blessed gods rejoice.” ἢ 


But this high assembly is far from being dignified or har- 
monious. Poor Hephestus, limping across the floor, is 
greeted with inextinguishable laughter. The device by 
which he entraps Ares and unfaithful Aphrodite, provokes 
the same demonstration from the entire group of gods,— 
the goddesses, for decency’s sake, having staid away from 
the brazen palace of the god of fire. The converse of the 
deities is disturbed by harsh mutual crimination. There 
is little domestic concord between Zeus and Hera. Some- 
times he takes pleasure in provoking her to anger. Then, 
like a timid husband, he advises Thetis not to be seen to 
leave his presence, lest Hera should raise new disputes and 
stir up his anger with contumelious language. ‘The Iliad 
and Odyssey abound in passages in which the gods charge 
each other with crimes and follies,—generally with good 
reason. When the final struggle takes place between the 
Greeks and Trojans, the deities are sent down by Zeus to 
fight for whichever side each may choose to favor; and 
when he beholds them in the fierce contest with each other, 


1 μάλ᾽ αἴθρη 


πέπταται ἀνέφελος, λευκὴ δ᾽ ἐπιδέδρομεν αἴγλη" 
τῷ ἔνι τέρπονται μάκαρες θεοὶ ἤματα πάντα. 
Od. vi. 44-46 (Bryant vi. 58-60). 
2 But this passage is considered an interpolation in the Poem. There 
is nothing in the Poem which is like it, in the way of burlesque upon the 
gods. 


82 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


from his quiet seat upon Olympus, he is said “ to laugh in 
his secret heart.” 

Yet Zeus is supreme. None of the deities can vie with 
him in strength. None venture to contend with him, hand 
to hand. When he rouses himself, he enforces silence and 
submission. Hera and Athena may sulk, but they obey. 
When his anger is excited, he even flings about the gods 
without ceremony, and to their imminent peril. There 
existed in the Greek mind a natural craving fora unity in 
the divine administration. The superiority of Zeus grati- 
fied, in some degree, this feeling. When the Greek thinks 
of no other god, he thinks instinctively of Zeus. Still 
more is the tendency to monotheism disclosed in the rela- 
tion of Zeus to his four children, Aphrodite, Hermes, 
Athena, and Apollo; especially to the two last. They 
stand as his deputies to execute his will and pleasure. The 
unifying tendency appears, also, in the conception of Fate 
—Moira—which in Homer hardly attains to the distinct- 
ness of personality. There were events which presented 
themselves to the Greek mind as the product of a blind, 
inevitable force. There were things which could not, 
without difficulty, be ascribed to the will of the gods; 
things which even Zeus deplored but could not help. 
Hence arose the notion of an all-determining Fate. In 
Homer, Fate is in some passages identified with the will 
of Zeus. Elsewhere there is a separation between the two. 
The idea hovers between a personification and a person.’ 

3. Modes of Divine Revelation. The gods made them- 
selves known by personal intercourse with men. They 
visit the earth, confer with mortals, and exhibit their 
preternatural attributes. But this communication between 
heaven and earth belonged, according to the Homeric be- 


‘On the Homeric idea of Moira, see Welcker, Griech. Gétterlehre, 
i. 186 sq. 


MODES OF REVELATION. 83 


lief, to an age prior to the Poet. The record is given of a 
state of things that had once existed, but had come to an 
end.’ Even in the epic period, during the Trojan war, 
there were no further marriages of gods and men. The 
divinities present themselves invisibly, or visibly in their 
real form, or—what is most common—in the shape of man, 
and frequently of some particular hero whose form and 
voice they simulate. There were signs by which they 
made known their will,—such as thunder and lightning, 
the sudden passing of a great bird of prey. Where portents 
were of doubtful import, it belonged to the art of the seer, 
or soothsayer, to interpret them. Yet auguries were not 
always regarded with trust. When the eagle dropped 
from his talons the bleeding serpent into the Trojan army, 
Hector refused to be turned from his purpose, saying to 
Polydamas : 

“Thou dost ask 

That I no longer reverence the decree 

Of Jove, the Thunderer of the sky, who gave 

His promise, and confirmed. Thou dost ask 

That I be governed by the flight of birds, 

Which I regard not, whether to the right 

And towards the morning and the sun they fly 

Or toward the left and evening. We should heed 

The will of mighty Jupiter, who bears 

Rule over gods and men. One augury 


There is, the surest and the best—to fight 
For our own land.” ? 


’ Nigelsbach, p. 132 seq. 

2 εἰ δ᾽ ἐτεὸν δὴ τοῦτον ἀπὸ σπουδῆς ἀγορεύεις 
ἐξ ἄρα δή τοι ἔπειτα ϑεοὶ φρένας ὥλεσαν αὐτοΐ, 
ὅς κέλεαι Ζηνὸς μὲν ἐριγδούποιο λαϑέσϑαι 
βουλέων, ἄστε μοι αὐτὸς ὑπέσχετο καὶ κατένευσεν" 
τύνη δ᾽ οἰωνοῖσι τανυπτερύγεσσι κελεύεις 
πείϑεσϑαι: τῶν οὔτε μετατρέπομ᾽, οὐδ᾽ ἀλεγίζω, 
εἴτ᾽ ἐπὶ δεξί᾽ ἴωσι πρὸς ᾿Ηῶ τ ᾿Ηέλιον τε, 
εἴτ᾽ ἐπ᾽ ἀριστερὰ τοίγε ποτί ζόφον ἠερόεντα. 
ἡμεῖς δὲ μεγάλοιο Διὸς πειϑώμεϑα βουλῇ, 


84 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Dreams were another great channel of divine revelation ; 
but these, likewise, might be of doubtful interpretation, or 
might be sent on purpose to misguide. More trustworthy 
than such outward vehicles of communication was the 
vision of the future, granted to individuals at favored 
moments, especially the open vision vouchsafed to the dying. 
Such a superhuman insight was the constant gift from the 
gods to select prophets, like Calchas, by whom not only 
the future, but the past and present also, were clearly be- 
held. Even these might not, in every case, command 
implicit confidence; so that the surest means of obtaining 
a knowledge of the gods, and of their will, was through their 
direct personal manifestation, in visible theophanies. The 
oracles, in Homer, are quite in the background. 

4. Piety and the expressions of it in worship and con- 
duct.—No doctrine and no law were communicated from 
the gods. There was no body of written teaching to serve 
as a standard of belief and conduct. The religious senti- 
ment through all the earlier ages of Grecian history was 
profoundly active. A sense of dependence on the gods, 
and of the need of their help, existed in all except the few 
who are denounced as impious. Hector says to Achilles: 


“T know that I 
In might am not thy equal, but the event 
Rests in the laps of the great gods.” ! 


Sacrifice and supplication, the two chief forms of devo- 
tion, attend every important undertaking and emergency of 
life. Thank-offerings follow upon good fortune. The 


ὅς πᾶσι ϑνητοῖσι καὶ ἀϑανάτοισιν ἀνάσσει. 
εἷς οἰωνὸς ἄριστος, ἀμύνεσϑαι περὶ πάτρης. 
Il. xii. 233-248 (Bryant, xii. 282-291). 
1 οἷδα δ᾽, ὃτι σὺ μὲν ἐσθλός, ἐγὼ δὲ σέθεν πολὺ χείρων. 
ἀλλ᾽ ἤτοι μὲν ταῦτα θεῶν ἐν γούνασι κεῖται. 


Il. xx. 484-435 (Bryant, xx. 545-547), 


PIETY AND ITS EXPRESSIONS. 8) 


deities occasionally visit their temples and shrines, where 
these exist ;} and with each of them a priest is connected. 
But there is no dominant hierarchy ; the father is priest 
in his own household. Prayers are chiefly petitions, and 
not unfrequently assume the form of claims on the ground 
of some service rendered by the suppliant to the divinity. 
When Chryses beseeches Apollo to give him redress for 
the wrong done by Achilles, he rests his appeal on the 
fact that he had decked the temple of the god, and burned 
goats and bullocks upon his altar. Zeus feels a kind of 
compunction in allowing Hector to be slain, who has 
offered him so many welcome gifts, and so many victims 
upon the altar.” Whether supplication was answered, or 
not, was contingent on the will of the divinities, which 
was determined not so much by general grounds of reason, 
or justice, as by personal favor, or disfavor. Moreover, the 
gods might resist and baffle one another, and so disappoint 
the hopes of the suppliant. Then to what god should a 
man in trouble resort? Which particular divinity was 
frowning upon him? The distracting effect of polytheism 
is constantly apparent in Homer. Resignation becomes a 
passive acquiescence in what is inevitably ordained. It is 
far removed from an active, cordial submission to the be- 
hest of a higher wisdom. Power eclipses the other attri- 
butes of divinity. Hence, the sufferer breaks out in loud 
complaints against the deities. Agamemnon more than 
once asserts that Zeus has cheated him. Menelaus, when 
his sword breaks in the duel with Paris, cries :— 


“Ὁ Father Jove! thou art of all the gods 
The most unfriendly.” 3 


1See Niigelsbach, 175. In only one passage is an image of a god ina 
temple referred to, (Il. vi. 92). 21]. xxiv. 91-95. 

3 Zev πάτερ, οὔτις σεῖο ϑεῶν ὀλοώτερος ἄλλος----ΤΊ. 111. 365 (Bryant, 111. 
447-448). 


86 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


This scolding of the gods on the part of men is for the 
most part, if not uniformly, directed against Zeus.! 

In the Homeric system, morality is interwoven with re- 
ligion. Justice and the fear of the gods are involved in 
each other. The heroes are simple and frank in the avowal 
of their feelings. When they are smitten with sorrow, 
they weep. Thus Achilles weeps aloud over Patroclus, 
and Ulysses and Telemachus weep aloud in each other’s 
embrace. Truthfulness is prized. Achilles declares that 
he who hides one thing in his heart, and utters another 
with his lips, is as hateful to him as the gates of hell.” So 
there is a sense of honor and of shame, which rise above 
the dread of censure, and spring from an ideal of worthy 
character. Above all, oaths are sacred, and oath-breakers 
detested by gods and men. The ties of affection, where 
they subsist, are peculiarly tender. Many passages of the 
deepest pathos, in the Iliad and Odyssey, are linked to 
this theme. The power of friendship is displayed in the 
relation of Achilles and Patroclus. Monogamy prevailed 
among the Greeks. The attachment of husband and wife 
to one another is deep and fervent. On the whole subject 
of the relation of the sexes, an air of purity and innocence 
pervades the Homeric poems. Maidenly modesty is held 
in honor. The wife must be faithful to her husband. The 
husband, though he may have concubines, is bound to the 
wife by a higher and an indissoluble tie. Only death 
dissolves their connection. The wife, though she may be 
acquired by purchase, is not a slave, but a companion, and, 
with certain qualifications, an equal. Homer has much to 
say of the silence and compliance that befit woman ; but 
his female personages, whether divine or human, exercise a 
high degree of practical freedom in speech. In the stories of 
Hector and Andromache, Ulysses and Penelope, we have pic- 


1 Niigelsbach does not admit any exception, p.194. ? Il.ix, 386-388. 


8 


THE TREATMENT OF ENEMIES. 87 


tures of refined domestic love. Ulysses says to Nausicaa :— 


“There is no better, no more blessed state, 
Than when the wife and husband in accord 
Order their household lovingly.” ἢ 

The thoughts of the wounded Sarpedon revert to his 
‘dear wife and little son.”? Helen, to express the depth 
of her attachment to Hector, tells him that he is “ father 
and dear mother” now to her. One of the most pathetic 
touches in the lament of Andromache, is the reflection that 
Hector had not been permitted to speak a word of comfort 
to her,on which she might think, day and night, with 
tears.2 The heart of Ulysses melted within him as he 
clasped his aged father to his breast. The Homeric poems 
abound in kindred references to the strength and tender- 
ness of parental, filial, and conjugal love. Even the lot of 
the slave was softened in families where the patriarchal sys- 
tem prevailed ; although it is said that the day that makes 
a man a slave takes away half of his worth. The min- 
strel, and the aged, have a right to kindness and protection. 

As concerns the treatment of enemies and the feelings 
excited by injury, we find abundant examples of unbridled 
anger and savage retaliation. On the battle-field of Troy, 
the heroes rage, much in the temper of the wolves, and 
wild boars, and ravenous lions, to which they are so often 
likened. They often deny quarter to the suppliant, and 
exult over his fallen body. Agamemnon advises Mene- 
laus to spare not a life among the Trojans :— 


“The very babe within his mother’s womb, 
Even that must die.” * 


ov μὲν yap τοῦ γε κρεῖσσον καὶ ἄρειον, 
ἢ OY ὁμοφρονέοντε νοήμασιν οἶκον ἔχητον 
ἀνὴρ ἠδὲ yuv_.—Od. vi. 182-184 (Bryant, vi. 229-232). 
217], v. 860-862. 3 Tl. xxiv. 945-946. 
4 


μηδ᾽ ὅντινα γαστέρι μήτηρ 
Κοῦρον ἐόντα φέροι, μηδ᾽ ὃς φύγοι" 
—Il. vi. 58-59 (Bryant, vi. 73-74). 


88 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Yet gentle sentiments are not wanting; and it is a mis- 
take, even in reference to the early stages of the Greek 
religion, to affirm that forbearance and forgiveness are 
wholly unknown. Magnanimity and mercy could never 
be imported into human nature, if some sparks of placable 
feeling were not native to the human soul. Peleus had 
warned Achilles that “gentle ways are best,” and bidden 
him “to keep aloof from sharp contentions.”! Agamem- 
non points to Pluto as the god who never relents, and pro- 
nounces him, on this account, of all the divinities, “ most 
hateful to men.” Patroclus was admired as a model of 
gentleness. Even Achilles, in a better mood, exclaims: 


— “Would that Strife 
Might perish among gods and men, with Wrath, 
Which makes even wise men cruel, and, though sweet 
At first as dropping honey, growing, fills 
The heart with its foul smoke.” ? 


Achilles will not be appeased, and never tires of inflict- 
ing vengeance, not sparing the dead body of his foe, and 
slaying twelve Trojans upon the funeral pile of Patroclus. 
But the wrath of Achilles ΒΒ subject of the Iliad. His 
immitigable anger is not held up for approbation, but rather 
as an object of censure, and even of loathing. The duty 
of forbearance is made to rest upon religious motives. 
The finest illustration of this whole subject is the exquisite 
speech which Phoenix made, “ with many sighs and tears,” 
to Achilles. After referring to his own tender nurture of 
the hero in his childhood, and to the hopes he had cherished 
respecting him, he exhorts him to subdue his spirit :— 

1 Tl, ix. 318-319. 


2 ὡς ἔρις ἔκ Te θεῶν, ἔκ τ᾽ ἀνθρώπων ἀπόλοιτο, 

καὶ χόλος, bor’ ἐφέηκε πολύφρονά περ χαλεπῆναι" 
ὅς Te πολὺ γλυκίων μέλιτος καταλειβομένοιο 
ἀνδρῶν ἐν στήθεσσιν ἀέξεται, HiTE καιτνός" 


--ἢ, xviii. 106-110 (Bryant, xviii. 137-140). 


HOSPITALITY AND LOYALTY. 89 


““Tll it becomes thee to be merciless: 
The gods themselves are placable, though far 
Above us all in honor and in power 
And virtue. We propitiate them with vows, 
Incense, libations, and burnt offerings, 
And prayers for those who have offended.” 1 


This may remind us of the eulogy of Mercy which 
Shakespeare puts into the mouth of Portia, and of her 
argument: “ We do pray for mercy.” 

The obligations of hospitality form a part of the Homeric 
code of duty. The guest is treated with a chivalrous cour- 
tesy ; his name is not even asked until he has sated his 
hunger at the table; and when he departs he is dismissed 
with gifts. The stranger and the poor man are under the 
special guardianship of Zeus, who will punish any who ill 
treat them, or refuse to befriend them. When one arrives 
on a foreign shore, his first anxiety is to know whether the 
people among whom he is to be thrown are “ god-fearing.”’ 
The duty of civil loyalty has a prominent place. Regal 
government is held to be the right form, as contrasted with 
the rule of the many, which is regarded with low esteem. 
The king receives his authority from Zeus; insubordina- 
tion in the subject has the character of impiety. Interna- 
tional rights, any farther than they are created by treaty, 
have no recognition. The war of Troy gives rise to leagues, 
truces, confederacies. But war is waged for purposes of 
revenge, or for robbery and plunder; and is barbarous in 
its laws and usages. 

5. Sin and Atonement.—The wrath of the gods is less 

1 ἀλλ᾽, ᾿Αχιλξυ, δάμασον ϑυμὸν μέγαν" οὐδέ τί σε χρὴ 
νηλεὲς ἦτορ ἔχειν. στρεπτοὶ δέ τε καὶ ϑεοὶ αὐτοί, 
τῶνπερ καὶ μείζων ἀρετὴ τιμῆ τε βίη τε. 
καὶ μὲν τοὺς ϑυέεσσι καὶ εὐχωληῆς ἀγανῇσιν, 
λοιβῃῇ τε κνίσσῃ τε, παρατρωπῶσ᾽ avdpwrot 


λισσόμενοι, ὅτε κέν τις ὑπερβήῃ καὶ ἁμάρτῃ. 


—Il. ix. 496-501 (Bryant, ix. 617-622). 


90 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


excited by offences against themselves directly, although 
these bring punishment upon the trangressor, than by in- 
fractions of the moral order, such as impiety towards pa- 
rents, cruelty to the stranger and to the poor, the infidelity 
of a wife to her husband.’ The lawless self-assertion and 
insolence—9feec—out of which wrongs of this charac- 
ter spring, is what calls down in a marked degree the 
divine displeasure. This temper provokes punishment at 
the hands of gods and men. Sin is an infatuation. The 
mind is deluded ; and this delusion of the understanding 
is attributed to an influence from the gods themselves. A 
Satanic element belongs to the divinities, and thus the feel- 
ing of responsibility is lessened. Among the chief motives 
to right conduct are the impulses of conscience, the sense 
of shame, dread of public opinion, the example of the gods, 
and the fear of punishment from them. A belief in the 
punitive righteousness of the gods is deeply ingrained in 
the Homeric man. There is an abiding conviction that 
“wrong prospers not” (Od. 1. 166). The destruction of 
Troy is decreed, because the Greeks had justice on their 
side in the original quarrel, and because the Trojans broke 
the Treaty. The rapacious and insolent suitors of Penelope 
were slain by the men whose rights they had invaded. 
Then Laertes cries :— 


“Ὁ Father Jove, assuredly the gods 
Dwell on the Olympian height, since we behold 
The arrogant suitors punished for their crimes.” ? 


The divine justice exerts itself in the retribution that 
alights on individual evil-doers. More is said of the pun- 
ishment of the wicked than of the reward of the good. 


1 See Nigelsbach, p. 269. 
2 Ζεῦ πάτερ, ἦ pa ἔτ’ ἐστε θεοὶ κατὰ μακρὸν "Ὄλυμπον, 
εἰ ἐτεὸν μνηστῆρες ἀτάσθαλον ὕβριν ἔτισαν. 


Od. xxiv. 351-352 (Bryant, xxiv. 426-428), 


SIN AND ATONEMENT. 91 


Sin is confessed. Agamemnon frankly acknowledges his 
faults. Helen speaks of herself as 


“ Lost to shame, and cause of many ills.” ! 


She laments that she was not, at her birth, whirled away 
by the blast, or swallowed up by the sea. She alludes to 
the labors of Hector, 


“or one so vile as I and for the sake of guilty Paris.” ? 
Agamemnon speaks of her as having brought dishonor 


“On women, even the faithful and the good ;” ὃ 


and she is not without a painful consciousness of the in- 
famy that awaits her. 

The sense of sin against the gods gives rise to the need 
of pardon and reconciliation. The offended. deity is ap- 
proached with offerings, attended with prayer. The sacri- 
fices are not presented as symbolical of the penalty incurred 
by the transgressor, as if this were transferred to the 
animal. They are rather gifts to the god, which gratify 
him, and imply an acknowledgment of his power, and of 
the honor due to him. But as the gods are actuated by 
no steady and impartial love to men, as they are not merci- 
ful and gracious on principle, the suppliant has no cer- 
tainty that his suit for pardon is effectual. The divinity 
may turn a deaf ear to his petition, and spurn his offering. 
And there are crimes which are unpardonable, from the 
penalties of which there is no room for deliverance. 

6. Life, Death and Immortality—It is a prevalent 
error to suppose that the ancients regarded human life as a 

1 __kuvoc κακομηχάνου, oxpvoéoonc.—ll. vi. 344 (Bryant, vi. 449). 
2 εἵνεκ᾽ ἐμεῖο κυνὸς καὶ ᾿Αλεξάνδρου ἕνεκ᾽ ἄτης. 
Il. vi. 856 (Bryant, vi. 462-463). 
3 —yarerny δὲ Te φῆμιν ὅπασσεν 
θηλυτέρῃσι γυναιξί, καὶ ἥ κ᾿ εὐεργός ἔῃσιν. 


Od. xxiv. 202-3 (Bryant, xxiv. 252). 


92 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


scene of joy. The ancient writers are full of reflections of 
an opposite character. Zeus himself is made to say, that 


“The race of mortal men 
Of all that breathe and move upon the earth 
Is the most wretched.” 1 


Laments and complaints relative to the hard lot of mortals, 
of various classes of men, and of individuals, are frequent 
on the pages of Homer. J ortune deserts the hero at the 
moment of seeming triumph. He becomes the victim of 
his own success. Nor is there any faith in a wise and 
merciful Providence that orders all things, and can make 
evil the occasion of good. Death offers no hope except 
that of a respite from anguish, or rest from pain. Its 
blessing is purely negative. The dead in Hades are 
spectres—ghostly images of the bodies worn on earth— 
groping about in the dark, with only a feeble remnant of 
their former life and intelligence. ‘The soul is so identi- 
fied with the body that there can be no conception of im- 
mortality without it. The departed heroes, who converse 
with Ulysses, must first drink blood in order to exercise 
the faculties of intelligence and memory. Achilles says 
to him :— 

“T would be 

A laborer on earth, and serve for hire 

Some man of mean estate, who makes scant cheer 


Rather than reign o’er all who have gone down 
To death.” 2 


There is no positive punishment in Hades, except for 


‘ov μὲν γάρ τί πού ἐστιν ὀϊζυρώτερον ἀνδρὸς 
πάντων, ὅσσα τε γαῖαν ἔπι πνείει τε καὶ ἔρπει. 
Il. xvii. 446-447 (Bryant, xvii. 537-539). 
2 βουλοίμην κ᾽ ἐπάρουρος ἐὼν ϑητευέμεν ἄλλῳ, 
ἀνδρὶ παρ᾽ ἀκλήρῳ, ᾧ μὴ βίοτος πολὺς εἴη, 
ἢ πᾶσιν νεκύεσσι καταφϑιμένοισιν ἀνάσσειν. 


Od. xi. 489-491 (Bryant, 602-606). 


TENDENCY TO MONOTHEISM. 93 


perjurers ; but there is, likewise, no reward. It is a region 
of flitting shadows; an abode of hopeless gloom. Menelaus, 
the favorite of the gods, was to be saved from this dismal 
lot, because his body was to be transported alive to the 
Elysian fields. Death, except for those whose sufferings 
had made existence itself a burden, was deprecated as an 
unmitigated curse. 

In this outline of the Homeric theology, we have pointed 
out an incipient tendency to monotheism, in the patriarchal 
supremacy of Zeus over the Olympian family, and, further, 
in the half-defined notion of an all-governing fate. We 
have found no conception of a Providence which might 
serve asa warrant for resignation under calamities, and 
for the hope of good to emerge out of evil. Nor is therea 
divine Love, to attract the rational confidence and reciprocal 
affection of men. There is, however, a moral government 
on the part of the gods; a condemnation and punishment 
of injustice; but even this conception is clouded and dis- 
figured by stories of crime and folly in the conduct of the 
gods themselves, and by particular instances of treachery 
and injustice in their dealings with individuals. And the 
Homeric religion kindles no consoling hope that reaches 
beyond the grave. 


When we pass from Homer to Sophocles, we find our- 
selves in a vastly purer atmosphere of moral and religious 
feeling. How numerous are the passages in this incom- 
parable poet which might fitly be incorporated in Christian 
teaching ! Inthe great writers who flourished in the glorious 
manhood of Greek life, under Athenian institutions, the less 
worthy conceptions of the primitive age retreat into the 
background, while the nobler features of the popular creed 
attain to a full development. 

1, The gods are still conceived of as clothed in corporeal 


94 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


form. Art gives to this form an ideal perfection. Their 
images abide in their temples ; and it is felt that when the 
image is taken away, the god forsakes his abode. But the 
divinities are no longer, as in Homer, obliged to be physi- 
cally present where their power is exerted. They can act 
from afar. There is a much more exalted notion of their 
might, as well as of their knowledge. Teucros, in the Ajax 
of Sophocles, says of the fatal belt and sword of Hector :— 


“1 must needs own the gods as working this, 
And all things else that come to mortal 
Men.” 1 


Xenophon, in the Anabasis, makes Clearchus say to Tissa- 
phernes that he who violates an oath can never be happy, 
‘* for whoever becomes the object of divine wrath, I know 
no swiftness can save him, no darkness hide him, no strong 
place defend him ; since, in all places, all things are subject 
to the power of the gods, and everywhere they are equally 
lords of 41]. 
Pindar speaks of 


“God, that o’ertakes the eagle’s wing 
And leaves the dolphin’s haste behind 
In the mid sea; whose chastening hand hath bow’d 
The lofty spirit of the proud, 
And given to modest worth the imperishable crown.” ὃ 


and in another place :— 


1 ἐγὼ μὲν ἂν καὶ ταῦτα Kai τὰ πάντ᾽ ἀεὶ 
φάσκοιμ᾽ ἂν ἀνθρώποισι μηχανᾶν θεούς. 
Ajax, 1036-1037. 

2 τὸν γὰρ ϑεῶν πόλεμον οὐκ οἶδα οὔτ᾽ ἀπὸ ποίου ἂν τάχους φεύγων τις 
ἀποφύγοι οὔτ᾽ εἰς ποῖον ἂν σκότος ἀποδραίη οὔϑ᾽ ὅπως ἂν εἰς ἐχυρὸν χωρίον 
ἀποσταίη. Anab. ii. 5, 7. 

8 θεός, ὃ καὶ πτερόεντ᾽ αἱετὸν κίχε, Kal θαλασσαῖον παραμείβεται 

δελφῖνα, καὶ ὑψιφροόνων tiv’ ἔκαμψε βροτῶν, 
ἑτέροισι δὲ κῦδος ἀγήραον παρέδωκ.᾽ 


Pyth. ii., Str. ii. 


CHARACTER GIVEN TO ZEUS. 95 


“Vain hope, that guilt by time or place, 
Can ’scape the searching glance of heaven.” ὁ 


The monotheistic tendency is conspicuously manifest in this 
period. The “ gods” are spoken of collectively, in relation 
to acts of divine government, as if a single agency or intel- 
ligence were in the mind of the writer. This is often ob- 
served in Demosthenes. The word ‘‘ god” is used in the 
singular number, when no particular divinity is meant, as 
if there were an obscure sense of one presiding, governing 
mind. These modes of speech are not unfrequent in the 
dramatic poets, in moments of deep feeling. Moreover, 
the regal domination of Zeus, as the centre of divine power 
and authority, receives a new emphasis. He is clothed 
with the attributes of might resistless, of wisdom, of father- 
hood, of truthfulness, and immaculate, unsleeping justice. 
Hermes, in ““ Prometheus Bound,” speaks thus: 


— “the lips 
Of Zeus know not to speak a lying speech, 
But will perform each single word.” ? 


In the “Seven against Thebes,” Justice is called ‘‘ Zeus’s 
Virgin Child.” Elsewhere, in /schylus, he is styled 


“Guardian of the just man’s dwelling ;᾽ 3 


and, in the same drama, 


“Our Father, author of our life, 
The King, whose right hand worketh all his will.’ ¢ 


1 —<j δὲ θεὸν ἀνήρ τις ἔλπεταί τι λαθέμεν ἔρδων, ἁμαρτάνει. 
—Olymp. i., Str. ii. 
2 ψευδηγορεῖν yap οὐκ ἐπίσταται στόμα 
τὸ Δῖον, ἀλλὰ πᾶν ἔπος TeAci.—Prometh. Vinct. 1053-1054. 
8 


οἰκοφύλαξ 
ὁσίων avdpov.—Suppliants, 26-27. 
4 πατὴρ φυτουργὸς, αὐτόχειρ ἄναξ 
γένους παλαιόφρων μέγας 
τέκτων, τὸ πᾶν μήχαρ οὔριος Zev¢-—Suppliants, 586-588. 


96 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


In Sophocles, Zeus is addressed (in the Cidipus at 


Colonos) as 
— “Lord omnipotent of gods, 
Who all on earth beholdest.” * 


Beside his throne dwells 
“ The eternal Right that rests on oldest laws.’’? 
The chorus thus consoles Electra: 


“‘ Mighty in heaven he dwells, 
Zeus, seeing, guiding all.” * 


There is 


“nothing which Zeus works not.” 3 


In the theology of this era, Fate (Moira) becomes subordi- 
nate to Zeus, whose will is supreme; but afterwards, Fate 
is identified with Fortune, (Tyche), and then, in the period 
of decline, this Power is placed behind and above all. 

The gods, especially Zeus, are the fountain of law. In 
ZEschylus, we read of 


“ Law sprung from Zeus, supreme Apportioner.” ὅ 


And a part of the law guards the right of the suppliant. 
Here belongs the memorable passage in the Antigone of 
Sophocles : 


“Nor did I deem thy edicts strong enough 

That thou, a mortal man, should’st over-pass 

The unwritten laws of God that know not change. 
They are not of to-day nor yesterday, 


1 ὦ Ζεῦ, πάνταρχ᾽, 
ὦ παντόπτα.---(). Col., 1085-1086. 
= εἴπερ ἐστὶν ἡ παλαίφατος 
Δίκη ξύνεδρος Ζηνὸς ἀρχαιοῖς νόμοις.---(Ε). Col., 1882-1383. 
3 ἔτι μέγας οὐρανῷ 
Ζεὺς, ὃς ἐφορᾷ πάντα καὶ kpativer—Electra, 174-175. 


4 κοὐδὲν τούτων 6 τι μὴ Zebc.—Maidens of Trachis, 1278, 
5—Géui¢ Διὸς KAapiov.—Suppliants, 354. 


RIGHTEOUSNESS OF THE DIVINE GOVERNMENT. 97 


But live forever, nor can man assign 

When first they sprang to being.” * 
Parallel with this is the splendid passage in the Ajax upon 
the sovereignty of law over winter, and night, and storm— 
over the mightiest things in nature, and by analogy, over 
human feeling and conduct.? There are not wanting as- 
sertions of the tenderness of Zeus; as in ‘the Maidens of 


Trachis :’?— 
“Who hath known in Zeus forgetfulness 


Of those he children calls.” ὅ 
It must be remembered that we have here the highest 
thoughts of the Greek mind upon divine things. It must 
not be supposed that this lofty mood was uniformly main- 
tained even by the few; much less, that it was diffused 
among the multitude, on whom the Homeric theology re- 
tained a firm hold. On the contrary, the doubts of the 
divine rectitude, which are uttered in Atschylus and Sopho- 
cles, must not be taken as habitual to the poets themselves. 
They represent the occasional questionings and perplexities 
which sprang up in view of the mysteries of life. A simi- 
lar struggle with doubt meets us in Joband in Ecclesiastes. 
Perhaps the most striking feature of the Greek popular 
faith, as reflected in the classic writers, is the righteousness 
of the divine government, evinced, in particular, in the pun- 
ishment of evil-doers. Not the worst men alone, as in Ho- 
mer, but transgressors generally, are punished in Hades, as 
well as on earth. Retribution surely, though it may be slow, 
overtakes the guilty. The idea that “if the millstones 
* οὐδὲ σθένειν τοσοῦτον φόμην τὰ σὰ 
κηρύγμαθ᾽, ὥστ᾽ ἄγραπτα κἀσφαλῆ θεῶν 
νόμιμα δύνασθαι θνητὸν ὄνθ᾽ ὑπερδραμεῖν. 
ov γάρ τι νῦν γε κἀχθές, ἀλλ᾽ ἀεί ποτε 
ζῇ ταῦτα, κοὐδεὶς οἶδεν ἐξ ὅτου ’φάνη.---Απἰϊρ., 458-457. 
2 Ajax, 668-678. 
8 ἐπεὶ τίς ὧδε 
ὲ τέκνοισι Ζήν᾽ GBovdov eidev—Maidens of Trachis, 139-140. 


98 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


of the gods grind slow, they grind fine,” was cherished, long 
before it was coined intoa proverb. The Greek tragedies 
would be emasculated, were they deprived of this pervading 
element. That which especially calls down the vengeance 
of the gods is haughty self-assertion, breaking through the 
bounds of law; the pride and insolence, which are ex- 
pressed in the word ὕβρίς. Zeus is called, in “the Per- 
sians” of Adschylus, “the avenger of o’er lofty thoughts.” * 
The ghost of Darius sends the admonition to Xerxes, 


“ To cease his daring sacrilegious pride,’”? 


and predicts that the slaughter of Platea will 


“witness to the eyes of men 

That mortal man should not wax over-proud ; 
For wanton pride from blossom grows to fruit, 
The full corn in the ear, cf utter woe, 

And reaps a tear-fraught harvest.” ὃ 


The daring transgressor, who tramples on justice, 


“as time wears on 
Will have to take in sail, 

When trouble makes him hers, and each yard-arm 
Is shivered by the blast.” 4 


Then he will call in vain for help, and, in the midst of 
“ woes inextricable,” ° will make shipwreck of his happi- 
1 Zebe τοι κολαστὴς τῶν ὑπερκόμπων ἄγαν 
φρονημάτων éreotiv.—Persians, 823, 824. 
3 λήξαι θεοβλαβοῦνθ᾽ ὑπερκόμπῳ Opaoer.—Persians, 827. 
: σημανοῦσιν ὄμμασιν βροτῶν 


ὡς οὐχ ὑπέρφευ θνητὸν ὄντα χρὴ φρονεῖν. 

ὕβρις γὰρ ἐξανθοῦσ᾽ ἐκάρπωσε στάχυν 

ἄτης, ὅθεν πάγκλαυτον ἐξαμᾷ θέρος.--ῬοΥδίαηδ, 815-818. 
4 τὸν ἀντίτολμον δὲ φαμὶ καὶ παραιβάτον 

τὰ πολλὰ παντόφυρτ᾽ ἄνευ δίκας 

βιαίως ξὺν χρόνῳ καθήσειν 

λαῖφος, ὅταν λάβῃ πόνος, 

θραυομένας Kepatac.—Eumenides, 523-527. 

5 ἐν μέσᾳ 


δυσπαλεῖ τε dive.—Ibid, 528, 529. 


THE PUNISHMENT OF PRIDE, 99 


ness. The feeling of Sophocles on this subject is expressed 
in the CAdipus Tyrannus, in the words :— 


“ But pride begets the mood 
Of wanton, tyrant power ; 
Pride filled with many thoughts, yet filled in vain, 
Untimely, ill-advised, 
Scaling the topmost height, 
Falls to the abyss of woe.” ! 


The “Antigone” winds up with the moral from the chorus :- 


“‘Man’s highest blessedness, 
In wisdom chiefly stands ; 
And in the things that touch upon the gods, 
’Tis best in word or deed, 
To shun unholy pride; 
Great words of boasting bring great punishments, 
And so to grey-haired age 
Teach wisdom at the last.” ? 


In the Ajax the same injunction is enforced :— 


“Nor boast thyself, though thou excel in strength, 
Or weight of stored-up wealth. All human things, 
A day lays low, a day lifts up again; 

But still the gods love those of ordered soul, 
And hate the eyil.” ὃ 


1 ὕβρις φυτεύει τύραννον" 

ὕβρις, εἰ πολλῶν ὑπερπλησθῇ μάταν, 

ἃ μὴ ’πίκαιρα μηδὲ συμφέροντα, 

ἀκρότατον εἰσαναβασ᾽ 

[αἷπος] ἀπότομον ὥρουσεν εἰς ἀνάγκαν, 

ἔνθ᾽ οὐ ποδὶ γρησίμῳ 

χρῆται. ---(Π. Rex., 873-879. 

πολλῷ τὸ φρονεῖν εὐδαιμονίας 

πρῶτον ὑπάρχει" χρὴ δ᾽ ἐς τοὺς θεοὺς 

μηδὲν ἀσεπτεῖν" μεγάλοι δὲ λόγοι 

μεγάλας πληγὰς τῶν ὑπεραύχων 

ἀποτίσαντες 

γήρᾳ τὸ φρονεῖν édidatev.—Antig., 1348-1353. 
μηδ’ ὄγκον ἄρῃ μηδέν᾽, εἴ τινος πλέον 

ἢ χειρὶ βρίθεις ἢ μακροῦ πλούτου βάθει. 

ὡς ἡμέρα κλίνει τε κἀνάγει πάλιν 

ἅπαντα τἀνθρώπεια: τοὺς δὲ σώφρονας 

θεοὶ φιλοῦσι καὶ στυγοῦσι τοὺς κακούς..----ΑἸαχ, 129-133. 


i} 


[1] 


100 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


There is no escape from punishment for any form of ini- 
quity. Pindar ends a verse in a strain that reminds one 
of the First Psalm :— 


“While he that walks sin’s wandering way, 
Ends not in bliss the changeful day.” 1 


The criminal is followed by 


“Vengeance, with hands that bear 
The might of righteousness.” ? 


If the murderer were to escape, atheism would be the 
result :— 
“For if the dead, as dust and nothing found, 
Shall lie there in his woe, 
And they shall fail to pay 
The penalty of blood, 
Then should all fear of gods from earth decay, 
And all men’s worship prove a thing of naught.’ 8 
Such lofty and inspiring sentiments place their authors 
far above the nominally Christian writers who have felt 
the enervating breath of a materialistic or Pantheistic 
creed. Unhappily these sentiments are connected with 
other notions which operated to diminish their proper in- 
fluence. The doctrine of an all-controlling Fate was one 
of these counteracting forces. The idea was entertained 
that a taint might cling to a particular family, like the 
race of Atreus, and blight one generation after another of 
its members. The Homeric theology contained the idea 
that the gods themselves tempt to sin, and spread a net to 
1 ovy ὁμῶς πάντα χρόνον θαλλῶν ducAet.—Isth. iii., Str. 1. 
2 Δίκα, δίκαια φερομένα χεροῖν xpdtn’'—Electra, 476. 
3 εἰ γὰρ ὁ μὲν θανὼν γᾶ τε καὶ οὐδὲν ὧν 
κείσεται τάλας 
οἱ δὲ μὴ πάλιν 
δώσους᾽ ἀντιφόνους δίκας, 
ἔρροι τ᾽ ἄν αἰδὼς 
ἁπάντων τ᾽ εὐσέβεια Ovarov.—Electra, 244-250. 


NEMESIS. 101 


ensnare the objects of their dislike. This idea gradually 
disappeared from Greek thought, at least as far as its best 
representatives are concerned. But pure faith in a moral 
government was adulterated by.the theory of Nemesis, 
which pursues the prosperous to their hurt and ruin. 
There is a certain measure of happiness which the gods 
accord to mortals. Whoever surpasses this measure is 
destined to have the cup dashed from his lips. The feel- 
ing that leads the peculiarly fortunate, at the height of their 
felicity, to be haunted with the apprehension of a reverse 
of fortune, might arise from the observation of life, and 
from an experience of the fact that the lot of men is mixed. 
But the Greeks held that the function of Nemesis goes 
beyond the chastisement of pride, and the punishment of 
prosperous ill-desert. The gods look with envy and dis- 
approval upon the happiness of mortals, however innocent 
the sources of it may be, when it rises higher than a mode- 
rate limit. Herodotus dwells upon this idea. He tells 
the tale of Polycrates who, in consequence of his uninter- 
rupted good fortune, threw his ring into the sea, that he might 
ward off greater disasters with which the envy of the gods 
might visit him.’ The story of Croesus which Herodotus 
narrates at length, is one of the marked illustrations of the 
vicissitude of fortune which is produced by the resentment 
of the gods. Auschylus is a witness to the prevalence of 
the tenet in a passage in which he expresses his own dis- 
sent from it :— 

“There lives an old saw, framed in ancient days, 

In memories of men, that high estate 

Full-grown brings forth its young, nor childless dies, 

But that from good success 
Springs to the race a woe insatiable. 


But I, apart from all, 
Hold this my creed alone: 


1 Book iii. 42 seq. 


102 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


For impious act it is that offspring breeds 
Like to their parent stock : 
For still in every house 
That loves the right their fate for evermore 
Rejoiceth in an issue fair and good.” 1 


So deeply seated among the ancients was the sense of 
the instability of fortune, as springing from the refusal of 
the divinities to tolerate in mortals a degree of happiness 
that seemed to encroach on their peculiar privilege, that a 
skeptic like Julius Czesar, on the evening when he made 
his triumphant entry into Rome, as master of the world, 
crawled upon his knees up the steps of the capitol to make 
a propitiatory offering to Nemesis. 

2. The number of the divinities is multiplied as time 
advances. The personifying impulse is not disposed to rest. 
Every perennial force, whether material or spiritual, is en- 
dowed with personal agency. Xerxes lashes the Helles- 
pont, as an act of punishment. Xenophon, on his retreat 
with the ten thousand, placates Boreas who blew fiercely in 
the faces of his men.” As the gods become more exalted, 
intermediate powers are introduced as their agents, to span 
the gulf that separates the higher divinities from men. 
The cultus of the heroes, children of the gods or goddesses, 
grows in importance. ‘The honors paid to the dead assume 
gradually the form of worship, the ceremonies of whic are 
performed at their burial places. Below the gods, and sieng 


1 παλαΐφατος δ᾽ ἐν βροτοῖς γέρων λόγος 
τέτυκται, μέγαν τελεσθέντα φωτὸς ὄλβον 
τεκνοῦσϑαι, μηδ᾽ ἄπαιδα θνήσκειν" 
ἐκ δ᾽ ἀγαθᾶς τύχας γένει 
βλαστάνειν ἀκόρεστον oiten, 
δίχα δ᾽ ἄλλων μονόφρων εἰμί: τὸ δυσσεβὲε νὰρ ἔργον 
μέτα μὲν πλείονα τίκτει, σφετέρᾳ δ᾽ εἰκότα yevva. 
οἴκων γὰρ εὐθυδίκων 
καλλίπαις πότμος aiet.— Agamemnon, (27-737. 
2 Anab., iv. 5. 4. 


THE DIVINITIES AND THEIR IMAGES. 1038 


with the heroes, are the demons, subordinate divinities, the 
instruments of divine intercourse with the world. Some 
of them are good, and some evil. The old methods of 
ascertaining the will of the gods, such as the move- 
ment of high-flying birds, which are near the sky, and 
atmospheric phenomena, as thunder and lightning, were 
still in vogue. Added to these supernatural signs, were 
the omens gathered from an inspection of the entrails of 
animals, it being supposed that the deity presided over 
the selection of them for sacrifice, and thus made known 
his mind. So, accidental occurrences, like the sudden, 
unexpected meeting of persons, and the test of the lot, had 
their religious interpretation. ‘There was direct revelation, 
too, by prophecy, sometimes, as in the case of Cassandra in 
ZEschylus, uttered in the ecstatic mood—the furor divinus— 
and sometimes, as in the case of Calchas and Tiresias, 
without this abnormal excitement. Oracles acquired a new 
and vast importance; and these are to be considered as 
mainly the fruit of enthusiasm, not of imposture. The 
oracle of Delphi exercised a great political influence, as 
exemplified in relation to such events as the battle of Mara- 
thon, and the creation of the Athenian marine. Its prestige 
naturally vanished with the downfall of Greek liberty, 
after it began, as Demosthenes expressed it, “‘ to philippize,” 
or to yield its authority to corrupt inducements. 

8. The visible objects of religious regard were multiplied 
under the mingled impulses of art and piety, and the rites 
of worship ramified in all directions. The Apostle Paul 
found in Athens, on every hand, signs of an excess of de- 
votion. The temples and households were filled with 
images of the gods. Sacred processions, festivals, amuse- 
ments in which religious observances formed a part, were 
of constant occurrence. There were prayers in the family ; 
thanks were rendered after meals, and in connection with 


104 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


all such events as marriages, births, and safe returns from 
a journey. With expiatory sacrifices, ceremonies of purifi- 
cation, as lustrations, are connected,—a step in advance of 
Homer. The need of sincerity and spiritual feeling in 
approaches to the gods, was understood by thoughtful minds. 
They understood, too, that the conduct of the worshipper 
must be consistent with his act of devotion. Says Cidipus, 
in Sophocles :— 


“T pray ye, by the Gods, as ye have raised me, 
So now deliver me, nor, with outward show 
Honoring.the Gods, then count the Gods as naught ; 
But think that they behold the godly soul, 
Beholding, too, the godless: never yet 
Was refuge found for impious child of man.” } 


It is only in the case of human sacrifices, as in the 
memorable example of Iphigeneia, or in offerings substituted 
for these, that the idea of vicarious expiation appears. 
And human sacrifices, though they reach down into his- 
torical times, were more and more repugnant to Greek 
feeling. Glimpses of a truth not clearly defined to the 
author’s own mind, occasionally appear ; as in the Cédipus 
at Colonos, where we read :— 

“For one soul working in the strength of love 
Is mightier than ten thousand to atone.” ? 
Excellence of character centred in σωφροσύνῃ ,---ἰ 6 prin- 
ciple of moderation and self-government, through which 
lav? ὧν ἱκνοῦμαι πρὸς θεῶν ὑμᾶς, ξένοι, 
ὥσπερ με κἀνεστήσασθ᾽' ὧδε σώσατε, 
καὶ μὴ θεοὺς τιμῶντες εἶτα τοὺς θεοὺς 
μοίρᾳ ποιεῖσθε μηδαμῶς" ἡγεῖσθε δὲ 
βλέπειν μὲν αὐτούς πρὸς τὸν εὐσεβῇ βρατῶν, 
βλέπειν δὲ πρὸς τοὺς δυσσεβεῖς, φυγὴν δέ του 
μήπω γενέσθαι φωτὸς ἀνοσίου.---(Ε) 4. at Col., 275-281. 
2 ἀρκεῖν yap οἷμαι κἀντὶ μυρίων μίαν 
ψυχὴν Tad’ ἐκτίνουσαν, ἦν εὔνους παρῇ. 


Cid. at Col. 499. 


THE ELEMENTS OF VIRTUE. 105 


the individual keeps within limits, both as concerns others, 
and as regards the inward subordination of the parts of his 
own nature. This spirit involves temperance, or the due 
control of the appetites of sense, and justice which gives to 
the neighbor his due. In the tragedians and other classic 
writers of that period, the stern spirit of law prevails, and 
the requital of injuries is approved. Curses are poured 
out on enemies. C£dipus exclaims:— 


“T did but requite the wrongs I suffered,” ἢ 


and Creon says: 


“T claim the right of rendering ill for ill.” ? 


It was reserved for philosophy, at a later date, to broach 
a milder doctrine. Yet placableness and forbearance were 
not unknown to the Greeks of an earlier day. Thus 
Oceanus reminds Prometheus that “wise words are the 
healers of wrath.” Ulysses says of Ajax :— 


“T know of no man, and I pity him, 

So wretched now, although mine enemy, 

So tied and harnessed to an evil fate, 

And thinking that it touches me as well; 

For this I see that we, all we that live 

Are but vain phantoms, shadows fleeting fast.” 3 


At Athens, there was public provision for orphans and for 
the help of the poor. Feelings of compassion for the 
destitute, the aged, and the suffering, find beautiful expres- 
sion in the best Greek literature. 


* ὅστις παθὼν μὲν avrédpwv.—CEhd. at Col. 271. 
2 ἀνθ᾽ ὧν πεπονθὼς ἠξίουν τάδ᾽ ἀντιδρᾶν.---(Π)4. at Col., 953. 
8 ἐγὼ μὲν οὐδέν᾽ οἶδ᾽, ἐποικτείρω δέ viv 
δύστηνον ἔμπας, καίπερ ὄντα δυσμενῆ, 
ὁθούνεκ᾽ ἄτῃ συγκατέζευκται κακῇ, 
οὐδὲν τὸ τούτου μᾶλλον ἤ τοὐμὸν σκοπῶν. 
Dt ia Padget Τὰ 3 ς 
ὁρῶ γὰρ ἡμᾶς οὐδὲν ὄντας ἄλλο πλὴν 
εἴδωλ᾽ ὅσοιπερ ζῶμεν ἢ κούφην σκιάν.---ΑἸαχ, 121-126. 


106 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Scattered up and down the poets are pathetic utterances 
of kindly feeling. C&dipus is touched with sorrow for 
others. He says :— 


—“ To use our means, our power, 
In doing good, is noblest service owned.” ! 


Theseus compassionates C&dipus, having been himself 
reared away from home, and having gone through many 
struggles. From no stranger in distress would he draw 
back ; for, he says, 


“T know that I am man, and I can count 
No more than thou, on what the morrow brings.” ? 


(Edipus feels that 


— They alone 
Can feel for mourners who themselves have mourned.” 3 


Deianeira in “The Maidens of Trachis” is smitten with 
compassion at the sight of captives :— 


—“Sad pity creeps on me, 
My friends, when I behold these wretched ones 
In a strange land as homeless, fatherless ; 
And they who sprang, perchance, from free-born sires, 
Now lead the life of bond-slaves.”’ 4 


1 ἄνδρα δ᾽ ὠφελεῖν ad’ ὧν 
ἔχοι τε καὶ δύναιτο κάλλιστος πόνων.---(Εᾷ, Rex, 315. 
3 ἔξοιδ᾽ ἀνὴρ Ov χῶτι τῆς ἐς αὔριον 
οὐδὲν πλέον μοι σοῦ μέτεστιν ἡμέρας. 
(Ed. at Col., 567-568. 
8 τοῖς yap ἐμπείροις βροτῶν 
μόνοις οἷόν τε συνταλαιπωρεῖν τάδε. 


(Ed. at Col., 1135-1136. 
4 ἐμοὶ yap οἶκτος δεινὸς eioé Bn, φίλαι, 
ταύτας ὁρώσῃ, δυσπότμους ἐπὶ ξένης 
χώρας ἀοίκους ἀπάτοράς τ᾽ ἀλωμένας, 
αἴ πρὶν μὲν ἦσαν ἐξ ἐλευθέρων ἴσως 
ἀνδρῶν͵ τανῦν δὲ δοῦλον ἴσχουσιν βίον. 


Maidens οὗ Trachis, 298-302. 


THE GREEK AND THE BARBARIAN. 107 


In contracting marriage, the female was passive; it was 
held to be her duty to live in retirement and in submission 
to her husband ; the rule of divorce was extremely lax, nor 
was the man, like the woman, held to be bound to connu- 
bial fidelity. Yet the idea of a higher relation of fellowship 
and equality between husband and wife is not wholly 
wanting. Nothing can exceed the beauty of many passages 
in Aeschylus and Sophocles, which touch upon the recipro- 
cal love of parents and children, and brothers and sisters. 
Ismene, in Cidipus at Colonos, cries out :— 


“My father and my sister ! 
Of all names sweetest.” 1 


Clytemnestra exclaims :— 
“Though wronged, a mother cannot hate her children.” 3 
Electra speaks sorrowfully of Orestes, and of 


—‘ All the nurture, now so profitless, 
Which I was wont with sweetest toil to give 
For thee, my brother.” ὃ 


The subordination of the citizen to the state merged 
every other duty in patriotism. The Greek acknowledged 
the bond that united him to other branches of the Hellenic 
race; but between the Greek and the barbarian a great 
gulf was set. The former, in the proud consciousness of 
superior gifts of nature, of a higher culture, and of more 
humane customs, denied to the rest of mankind the con- 
sideration which he accorded to the people of his own 

1 ᾧ δισσὰ πατρὸς καὶ κασιγνήτης ἐμοὶ 
ἥδιστα προσφωνήμαθ᾽.---(Ε) 4. at Col., 324-325. 
2 οὐδὲ γὰρ κακῶς 
πάσχοντι, μῖσος ὧν τέκῃ Tpooyiyverat.—Electra, 770-771. 
3 οἴμοι τάλαινα τῆς ἐμῆς πάλαι τροφῆς 
ἀνωφελήτου, τὴν ἐγὼ θάμ’ ἀμφὶ σοὶ 
πόνῳ γλυκεῖ tapécyov.—Electra, 1143-1145. 


108 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


lineage. After the attempt to enslave Greece, which led to 
the Persian wars, the hostility of Greeks to barbarians _be- 
came a traditional sentiment. Greeks might hold one 
another in slavery, but captive Greeks might not be sold 
to barbarians. 

There was a deeper apprehension of sin in the post-Ho- 
meric era. Sin was conceived of, not only as an infraction 
of the moral order, but as a rebellion against the gods,—as 
practical atheism, or ungodliness. Nor do the gods any 
longer tempt the innocent tosin. It is only those who have 
sinned whom they entice onward to the commission of 
further iniquities, by which their retribution is rendered 
more severe. This agency of the deities, by which sin is 
made itself a divine judgment, and the transgressor is made 
to wade deeper and deeper in the mire of guilt and suffer- 
ing, 15 quite prominent in the post-Homeric writers. 

4. That human life is replete with trouble and sorrow 
᾿ continues to be the subject of plaintive remark. It is an 
undertone in the literature of the most brilliant period of 
Grecian history. The chorus in Cidipus Tyrannus thus 
exclaims :— 

“ Ah, race of mortal men, 
How as a thing of naught 
I count ye, though ye live; 
For who is there of men 
That more of blessing knows, 
Than just a little while 


To seem to prosper well, 
And, having seemed, to fall ?”’ 4 


Ajax, in his wretchedness, looking on his child, says: 


133 : Ξ 
ἰὼ γενεαὶ βροτῶν, 
ἃ t ~ ν Ν Ν δέ Ζῶ , 6 ~ 
ὡς ὑμᾶς loa καὶ τὸ μηδέν ζῶσας ἐναριθμῶ, 
τίς γὰρ, τίς ἀνὴρ πλὲον 
τᾶς εὐδαιμονίας φέρει 
ἢ τοσοῦτον ὅσον δοκεῖν 


καὶ δόξαντ᾽ ἀποκλῖναι ?—Ckd. Rex, 1186-1192. 


LIFE AND DEATH. 109 


—“ Sweetest life is found 
In those unconscious years ere yet thou know 
Or joy or sorrow.’’? 


Pindar sings :— 


“ But o’er men’s hearts unnumbered errors hang; 
Nor can dim Reason’s glimmering show 
The flowery path untrod by woe, 
Or find the day’s delight, that brings no sorrow’s pang.’’? 


And again :— 


“Tis not given for man to know 
When pale death shall strike the blow, 
Nor e’en if one serener day, 
The sun’s brief child, shall pass away 
Unclouded as it rose. The waves 
Of life with ceaseless changes flow, 
And, as the tempest sleeps or raves, 
Bring triumph or disaster, weal or woe.” ὃ 


That “no man is to be thought happy until after his 
death ’’ was one of the most familiar of proverbs, to illus- 
trate the mutable lot of humanity. 

Hades continued to be a region of gloom. It came to 
be considered a scene of trial and judgment, and of rewards, 
as well as of sufferings. The soul was no longer so identi- 
fied with the body, as in Homer. Yet seldom is any bright 


1 ἐν τῷ φρονεῖν yap μηδὲν ἥδιστος βίος, 
ἕως τὸ χαίρειν καὶ τὸ λυπεῖσθαι μάθῃς. 
Ajax, 554-555. 
2__yrow βροτῶν ye κέκριται 
meipac ὃν τι θανάτου, 
οὐδ᾽ ἁσύχιμον ἁμέραν ὁπότε, παῖδ᾽ ἁλίου, 
ἀτειρεῖ σὺν ἀγαθᾷ τελευτάσομεν" ῥοαὶ δ᾽ ἄλλοτ᾽ ἄλλαΐ, 
εὐθυμιᾶν τε μετὰ καὶ πόνων ἐς ἄνδρες ἔβαν, 
Olymp. ii. Ant. ii. 
8—augi δ᾽ ἀνθρώπων φασὶν ἀμπλακίαι 
λναρίϑμητοι κρέμανται" τοῦτο δ᾽ ἀμάχανον εὑρεῖν, 
ὅτι νῦν ἐν καὶ τελευτᾷ φέρτατον ἀνδρὶ τυχεῖν. 


Olymp. vii., Str. ii. 


110 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


anticipation connected with death. The enthusiasm of 
Cidipus seems to intimate a happy hereafter; yet there we 
find no definite suggestion of such a prospect. On occa- 
sions where we might look for some glowing expression of 
hope in reference to the departed, as in the funeral ora- 
tion of Pericles for the fallen patriots, there is an ominous 
silence? The consciousness of guilt left a sting in death. 
The Orphic and Eleusinian mysteries were a means of 
purifying the conscience, and of awakening more joyful 
hopes for the future. Underlying the former was the Py- 
thagorean tenet of transmigration. Theaim was to cleanse 
the soul from sin and guilt, and thus to give peace to the 
conscience, and a better hope. The Eleusinian ceremonies, 
acting principally upon the feelings, served to dispel the 
gloomy dread of the grave, and to infuse a more glad belief 
and anticipation respecting the destiny of the soul, The 
hopes thus engendered find expression in Pindar. In 
passages, which Plutarch cites in the “ Consolation to Apol- 
lonius,”* the Poet describes the abode of the righteous, where 
there is no night, where grow the fairest blossoms and the 
most fragrant plants, and trees exhaling the sweetest per- 
fume : 


“Death doth its efforts on the body spend, 
But the aspiring soul doth upward tend. 
Nothing can damp that bright and subtile flame 
Immortal as the Gods from whence it came.” ὁ 


In the second Olympic Ode, the lot of the good, whose 
souls have thrice stood a trial on earth, and are now in the 
Happy Isle, among gentle breezes and “ blooms. of gold,” 
is contrasted with the doom of the bad. In the tragic 


1d at Col., 1611seq. ? Thucyd., ii. 35-46. * Consol. ad Apoll. xxxv. 
4 σῶμα μὲν πάντων ἕπεται 
θανάτῳ περισθενεῖ, ζῶν 
δὲ λείπεται αἰῶνος εἴδωλον" 
[τὸ] γὰρ μόνον ἐστίν ἐκ θεῶν. 


THE FUTURE LIFE. 111 


poets, it is only the select few, like Agamemnon, who, 
being raised in the under world to the rank of heroes, and 
even invoked, have a blessed lot. But apart from the in- 
fluence of the mysteries upon the initiated class, and as 
regards the mass of the people, it is probable that the 
Homeric notions still prevailed, and were the foundation 
of the popular beliefs respecting the dead. With the culti- 
vated, with the exception of a select band of philosophers, 
the desire of posthumous fame took the place of the faith 
in a future, immortal existence of the soul. 


112 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER IV. 


THE POPULAR RELIGION OF THE GREEKS AND ROMANS AND 
ITS DECLINE. 


Ir is natural to ask how the Greeks could ever have 
given credence to the myths which attributed gross immo- 
rality to the gods, and at the same time have continued to 
venerate them. How could men adore, and laud as just 
and good, beings to whom they imputed deeds of treachery, 
lust, and cruelty, such as, when done by men, they abhorred ? 
In the history of religion it is often found that incongruous 
conceptions may abide in the mind without jostling each 
other. The myths in question might be credited, in an 
unreflecting age, without prompting to such an induction 
relative to the general character of the gods, as these stories 
would logically warrant. These exalted beings might be 
thought to stand on a different plane as to moral responsi- 
bility, and to enjoy a license not the privilege of mortals. 
Some might be content to leave the crimes and infirmities 
of the gods in the twilight of mystery, not allowing their 
general habit of reverence to be disturbed by their in- 
ability to solve difficulties. The ambition of the leading 
families in Greece to trace their descendants to the gods 
tended to multiply the tales relative to theamours of Jove, 
and of his Olympian companions. The combination of 
myths having a separate origin—the identification of deities 
having different names—had the same effect. Not an 
impure fancy chiefly, but circumstances attending the 


OBJECTIONS TO THE MYTHS. 119 


growth of mythology in the form in which it was cast by 
the poets, had led to the creation of these offensive stories. ! 
One main key to the solution of the problem just presented 
lies in the peculiar anthropomorphic idea of the government 
exercised by the dwellers upon Olympus. It was fashioned 
after the analogy of city governments so familiar to Greek 
experience. One civil administration might subvert an- 
other ; individuals clothed with authority might occasion- 
ally abuse their power, and avail themselves of their 
extraordinary opportunities for the gratification of ambition 
and lust; yet, on the whole, justice was administered, 
society was protected, government was a blessing, and 
rulers were to be loyally and reverently supported. Zeus 
and the members of his great council might wrangle with 
one another, and the ruling body might be torn by faction, 
and its members do deeds of fraud and violence; yet, in 
the main, it was a righteous and wholesome sway which 
they exercised over men. ‘The time must come, however, 
and did come, when the myths to which we refer, became 
repugnant to the moral sense, and men were reluctant to 
believe such things of their divinities. Then they were 
rejected as an invention of the poets, or explained away by 
some device of interpretation. This protest on moral 
grounds goes back as far as Pindar. He declares 
that nothing but what is becoming should be related 
of the heavenly powers. 7 He denounces as blasphemous 
the story of the cannibal feast spread for the gods by the 
father of Pelops. * -Xenophanes also, in the sixth century 
before Christ, openly attacked on moral grounds the 
mythical tales of Homer and Hesiod. He also drew at- 
tention to the anthropomorphic character of the popular 
religion, as shown in the fact that the Ethiopians make 


1 Compare K. O. Miiller, Prolegomena, Engl. transl., p. 294. 
® Ol. Od. i. Str. ii, 5 Tbid. Ep. ii. 
8 


114 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the images of their gods black and with flat noses, as tne 
people are themselves; the Thracians, on the other hand, 
make their gods blue-eyed and red; and in general every 
nation copies its own physical characteristics. He said 
that if beasts were to draw a likeness of the gods, the horses 
would make them like themselves, and so oxen and lions 
would ascribe their own forms to the divinities. Xeno- 
phanes himself asserted the unity of God, according to a 
Pantheistic conception. Afterwards the philosophers, Soc- 
rates and Plato, and their contemporary, the orator Isoc- 
rates, deny that anything is true of the gods but what is 
honorable and worthy, and reject the immoral fables as 
the product of fiction. 

But the entire fabric of mythology, being a creation of 
the fancy of rude and simple ages, was ill fitted to bear an 
examination. It must betray its weakness the moment it 
is exposed to the light of rational inquiry. The expan- 
sion of the Greek mind brought with it the spirit of in- 
vestigation. Natural philosophy had another explanation 
to give for physical phenomena than that of the incessant 
interference of a crowd of personal divinities. Historical 
study dissolved many a sacred legend, taught men to call 
for proofs where no proofs could be forthcoming, and tended 
to inspire a general temper of distrust in regard to the 
popular creed. As civilization advanced, and men in large 
numbers were trained to use their reason in the complex 
affairs of peace and war, the weak places in the traditional 
faith must become more and more exposed to view.’ Al- 
legory was a natural method of treating what could not 
safely be made the object of a direct assault. Anaxagoras 
pronounced the several deities to be symbols of physical 
forces, and thus converted the whole mythology into a 


1For a description of this intellectual change, see Grote’s Hist- of 
Greece, i. ch. xvi. 


PROGRESS OF SKEPTICISM. 115 


scheme of natural philosophy. Metrodorus, on the con- 
trary, resolved the popular system into a moral philoso- 
phy, by identifying the deities with abstract ethical pre- 
cepts. These were not isolated individuals, but represented 
schools, or more general movements, of opinion. Anaxag- 
oras, a man of great ability, asserted that the sun, instead 
of being alive, as was universally supposed, was a stone, 
incandescent and larger than the Peloponnesus. The 
moon, he said, was an earth, with heights and hollows. 
He denied, also, destiny—efyaouévy—and pronounced it 
an empty word. He went so far, moreover, as to deny 
the reality of the signs and omens on which auguries were 
founded. When Lampon the diviner, predicted from 
the circumstance that a ram with one horn was found on 
the farm of Pericles, that his party would triumph over 
the opposite faction and obtain the government, the 
philosopher dissected the skull, and showed to the by- 
standers the natural cause of the phenomenon in the 
peculiar shape of the animal’s brain. It is worth while to 
observe that Plutarch argues that both the philosopher, 
and the diviner were right. The divine agency had 
shaped the brain of the ram that it might serve as a sign 
of what was to occur. Prosecuted for impiety, Anaxagoras 
was delivered only by the strenuous exertions of Pericles. 
Some, as Diagoras of Melos, in the latter part of the 5th 
century Β. C., if the traditions about him are to be ac- 
cepted, avowed a downright atheism. He is said to have 
indicated his general tone of feeling by throwing a wooden 
image of Hercules into the fire to cook a dish of lentils. 
Then, in the time of Alexander the Great, Euemerus arose, 
who broached the doctrine that the myths are exaggera- 
tions of veritable human history,—natural persons and 
events, raised by fancy to the height of the supernatural. 


1 Vita Periclis, 


116 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Zeus, for example, was once a king of Crete, and a con- 
queror. It was claimed that his grave had been found. 
His position and achievements as a god were the result of 
a poetic transformation. It belonged to historical inquiry 
to penetrate to the real nucleus at the centre of the mythi- 
cal and legendary narratives. This naturalistic theory of- 
fered a plausible ground for many to stand upon, who 
shrank from a total rejection of the old traditions. 

The dramas of Euripides, in connection with the way 
in which they were received, afford striking evidence that 
an era of skepticism was arising which provoked a reac- 
tionary hostility on the side of conservative and supersti- 
tious feeling. The irreverent and unbelieving utterances 
which the poet put into the mouths of some of his characters 
awakened the wrath of his auditors. A certain degree of 
liberty in this direction must be allowed to a dramatist, 
and had been exercised here and there by Sophocles, and, 
though to a less extent—if we except the Prometheus, where 
there was justification in the peculiarity of the theme, and 
in the final part of the trilogy—by Aéschylus. In Milton's 
Paradise Lost, or in the “Two Voices” of Tennyson, the 
poet is not to be charged with all the sentiments uttered 
in the dialogue. But there was a skeptical tone in Euri- 
pides, a betrayal of sympathy on the part of the writer 
with the obnoxious sentiments expressed by the personages 
of the drama,—which, coupled with the increased sensi- 
tiveness of his audiences, excited their anger and caused 
them, on one occasion at least, to drown the voice of the 
actors with their indignant outcries. It was the age of the 
Sophists, and Euripides had caught the spirit of the time. 
Whatever merit may have belonged to individuals among 
the Sophists, however legitimate and useful their vocation as 
teachers may have been, there is no reason, notwithstand- 
ing the defence of them by Mr. Grote, to modify essentially 


THE PROGRESS OF SKEPTICISM. 117 


the verdict of the best of their contemporaries concerning 
their character and influence. Their method fostered a 
skepticism which tended not only to undermine the mytho- 
logical system, but to subvert generally the foundations of 
religious truth. The maxim of Protagoras that man, 
meaning each individual, is the measure of all things, was 
an assertion of the relativity of knowledge, which strikes 
at the root of objective reality.’ The cleverness and logical 
dexterity which their training was directed to produce, in 
the absence of a proportionate development of moral feeling, 
was unfavorable to positive convictions of any sort. The 
philosophical service of the Sophists was of a negative and 
destructive sort.2. They pulled down, but could not build 
up. Hence their existence is an indication of the change 
which was passing over the Greek mind, and which their 
influence helped to accelerate. 

The influence of historical curiosity, and the growth of 
a historical sense, in overturning the popular faith, were 
potent. This effect appears, in a certain degree, in Hero- 
dotus, who, with all his natural devoutness and credulity, 
is driven by his own reflection to subtract something from 
the legends; for instance, to reject the story of the miracu- 
lous labors of Hercules. In one remarkable passage He- 
rodotus asserts, on the ground of what he had learned at 
Dodona, that the ancient Pelasgi, the ancestors of the 
Greeks, had given no distinct names or appellations to the 
gods, but had prayed to them collectively. Their names, 
the historian erroneously thought, came from Egypt. But 
as for the special epithets attached to them, and the func- 


1Diog. L. ix. 51. (Ritter and Preller, Hist. Phil., p. 132.) The 
maxim of Protagoras is confuted by Plato, in the Theetetus. 

2For an impartial estimate of the influence of the Sophists upon Phi- 
losophy, see Zeller, Phil. d. Griechen, i. 244, seq. The views of Mr. 
Grote are confuted by Prof. Blackie in his Hore Hellenice, p. 197, seq. 


118 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


tions or occupations severally attributed to them-~ali this. 
he says, goes no further back than Homer er Hesiod.* 
Yet the comparatively recent date of this change appears 
not to have affected the credence which Herodotus gave te 
the body of the Homeric and Hesiodic system. In Thu 
eydides, the historical feeling is much more apparent. 
Grecian antiquity is dealt with in a calm, judicial tone, 
which, whatever may be said of the particular results ar- 
rived at, is in marked contrast with the unquestioning cre- 
dulity of a former day. There is a characteristic remark 
of this great historian, which follows his interesting account 
of the plague at Athens. There had been an ancient pre- 
diction, so the old men said, that two heavy judgments 
would come at once; a Doric war without, and a pestilence 
within, the walls. There had been a dispute whether the 
correct reading of the prophecy was λοιμός, a plague, or λεμός, 
a famine. The people concluded that Aoeuoc—a plague— 
was the right word; “but, in my judgment,” says Thucy- 
dides, “should they ever again be engaged in a Doric war, 
and a famine happen at the same time, they will have re- 
course with equal probability tothe other interpretation.” ? 
Thucydides records without comment the alarm occasioned 
in the army of Nikias by an eclipse of the moon, and the 
consequent delay of the commander, acting under the ad- 


1 Οὗτοι [Hesiod and Homer] δέ εἰσι οἱ ποιήσαντες θεογονίην “EAAnot, καὶ 
τοῖσι θεοῖσι τὰς ἐπωνυμίας δόντες, καὶ τιμάς τε καὶ τέχνας διελόντες καὶ εἴδεα 
αὐτῶν onunvavtec.—Lib. 11. 58. Grote regards Herodotus as here “re: 
cognizing Homer and Hesiod as the prime authors of Grecian belief 
respecting the names and generations, the attributes and agency, the 
forms and worship, of the gods.” Hist. of Greece, i. 483. Blakesley 
(Herodotus, i. 207, n. 153) considers this a too sweeping judgment on 
the part of Grote, and would make Herodotus ascribe to the Poets the 
work of “giving a symmetry and consolidation to the popular creed and 
clothing it in the language of poetry.” 

2 ἣν dé ye οἶμαι ποτὲ ἄλλος πόλεμος καταλάβῃ Δωρικὸς τοῦδε ὕστερος Kat 
ξυμβὴ γενέσθαι λιμόν, κατὰ τὸ εἰκός οὕτως goovtarc.—Hibst., 11. 54. 


THE PROGRESS OF SKEPTICISM. 119 


vice of soothsayers, to withdraw his forees—a delay which 
contributed to their destruction. The silence of the histo- 
rian must be taken as equivalent to an explicit condemnation. 
The remarks of Plutarch, in his life of Nikias, on this 
event, are worthy of note. Before that time, he says, com- 
mon people had learned that an eclipse of the sun is occa- 
sioned by an interposition of the moon. Anaxagoras had 
explained the cause of an eclipse of the moon, also; but 
his book was kept concealed, and was in the hands of but 
few. Hence, the fright of the Athenian army which looked 
upon such an occurrence as the prognostic of great calami- 
ties. “The world,” says Plutarch, “could not bear that 
naturalists and meteor-mongers, as they were then styled, 
should seem to restrain the divine power by explaining 
away its agency into the operation of irrational causes and 
senseless forces acting by necessity, without anything of 
Providence, or a free agent.’ For such attempts Protago- 
ras was banished ; and Pericles, with much ado, procured 
the release of Anaxagoras, when he was thrown into prison. 
Nay, Socrates, who never meddled with any of these points, 
was, however, put to death upon the charge of philosophi- 
zing.” Plutarch, himself a devout heathen of the first 
century, was much too enlightened not to perceive the 
superstition of Nikias and his troops, as they had too much 
knowledge to be disturbed by an eclipse of the sun, which 
would have terrified their predecessors. Plutarch here lets 
fall a word which gives the real occasion of the death of 
Socrates. He abjured physical studies and speculations ; 
he was a believer in the gods; he even adduced the doc- 
trine of Anaxagoras about the sun as a proof of the vain 
and profitless character of such inquiries ;* but his habit 


Ν Ν Z 
lov γὰρ ἠνείχοντο τοὺς φυσικοὺς καὶ μετεωρολέσχας τότε καλουμένους, ete. 
—xxiii. 16. 
2 Xenophon, Mem., iv. 7. 


120 JHE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


of subjecting moral and political doctrine to the scrutiny 
of reason, and his logical fencing, savored of rationalism, 
and offended the populace. Aristophanes classified him 
with the Sophists; he was condemned as one of the cor- 
rupters of youth. Comedy took the side of conservatives, 
against the disintegrating tendency developed among intel- 
lectual men. But the Comedy itself, by the ridiculous 
aspect in which it exhibited the divinities, not to speak of 
its other characteristics, injured the cause which it pretended 
at first to serve. 

Thucydides makes it clear that the Peloponnesian war 
had a fatal influence upon the national religion. The 
bonds of morality were relaxed. The obligation of an oath, 
the sanctity of which had ever been held in the highest 
reverence, was no longer regarded, when self-interest 
prompted its violation. The religion of Greece fell with 
its liberty, and shared in its political ruin. “For the 
Greek religion,” says Curtius, “was not a supersensuous 
religion, reaching beyond the bounds of space and time, 
and inspiring hopes of a world hereafter; but it was inter- 
woven in the closest way with actually existing conditions 
and circumstances; it was a national and a state religion, 
and its maintenance was the condition as well as the guar- 
anty of the public weal. The national gods were so in- 
corporated with the states in which they were worshipped, 
that they were held accountable for the commonwealth, ~ 
and, therefore, the confidence in them was gone, when the 
commonwealth entrusted to their care was seen to fall.’”’? 
The terrible failure of the Sicilian expedition under Nikias 
led to a contempt for prophecy, which in this case had been 
falsified, and for the religious strictness which had led to 
defeat. Democracy produced an impatience of all autho- 
rity. Foreign divinities were brought in, and a struggle 


1 History of Greece, iii. 56. 


THE ROMAN RELIGION. 121 


of superstition and unbelief arose, like that which attended 
the decadence of the religion of Rome. Thenceforward, 
cultivated men resorted to philosophical discussion as a 
source of amusement and solace, while the common herd 
adhered to the ancient rites and forms, from which the life 
and spirit, and most of the power they had possessed to 
curb the passions, and to soothe and elevate the soul, had 


fled. 


The Romans and the Greeks were descended from a com- 
mon stock, The rudiments of their religion, like the foun- 
dations of their language, therefore, had been the same. 
Thus, in common with all the branches of the Indo-Ger- 
manic family, the progenitors of both peoples worshipped a 
god of the effulgent heavens, the Shining One, who thunders 
in the sky—Zeus, or Jupiter. But as the Romans differed 
from the Greeks, so their religious development was essen- 
tially diverse. The Greeks were quick, versatile, imagina- 
tive. Their senses and feelings were alive to the impres- 
sions of nature in its manifold forms. The Romans lacked 
imagination, and esthetic power; but they had a sobriety, 
a dignity, and a moral sense, which we miss in the Hellenic 
character. The Greeks, moreover, were so placed, geo- 
graphically, that their mental tendencies were stimulated 
by a maritime life, and by contact with the peoples inhabit- 
ing the neighboring islands, and the mainland of Asia and 
Egypt. How much their religion owed to Semitic, and 
other oriental influences, is a point not yet determined. The 
Romans, cut off from the marvels and adventures of the 
sea, and shut up to a simple agricultural life, gave to their 
religion no such poetic expansion as that which we find 
among the Greeks. In fact, they had no national epos. 
Heroic figures like Hercules, Ulysses and Aineas, are bor- 
rowed from the Greeks. 


122 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


The Roman divinities were of different sexes, but were 
commonly childless. There existed only the elements of a 
cosmogony and theogony. The Romans were always great 
formalists. Their worship consisted in the punctilious ob- 
servance of a carefully defined ritual. Their deities have 
not that concreteness, that vivid personality, which belongs 
to the gods of Greece. There was a class of beings—as 
Genii, Lares, Manes, Penates—who did not of themselves 
possess the distinct character of persons, but acquired it only 
as they were identified with individuals, nations, cities, and 
localities, or with definite functions and occupations of men.! 
The term numen, so frequently used to denote the exertion 
of power by a divinity, has a characteristic vagueness. At 
the dedication of temples, and on occasions of public ca- 
lamity—for instance, when an earthquake occurred—the 
Romans either invoked the gods in common, or attached a 
proviso which rendered their supplications applicable to any 
god or goddess who might be concerned in the event. 

At first the number of gods whom the Romans adored 
was small. But three causes conspired to multiply this 
number to an almost indefinite extent.* The first was the 
old custom of evocation, or the habit of inviting the divini- 
ties who protected the cities which they were besieging, to 
abandon them, and take up their abode at Rome, whither 
their worship was transplanted. To avoid a similar act on 
the part of their enemies, the Romans in early times kept 
the names of their own gods secret. | Secondly, the quali- 
ties originally ascribed to their divinities were expressed in 
the substantive, instead of the adjective form; and this 
gave rise to a throng of deities extremely abstract in their 
character,—such as Equitas, Clementia, Salus, Voluptas. 
Thirdly, the appellations of the gods were in part the same 


1 See Preller, Rim. Mythologie, p. 45. 
2 See Becker and Marquardt, Rom. Ali., Th. iv. p. 21 seq. 


MINGLING OF GREEK RELIGION WITH THE ROMAN. 123 


among the Romans and the Italians, while the rites of wor- 
ship were often dissimilar. Hence, when the Italian di- 
vinities were transported to Rome, this difference in the 
modes of worship led to an entire departure from the origi- 
nal notion of the divinity. Thus Juno was worshipped 
very diversely in the various Italian towns; and at Rome 
she was worshipped under different appellations and forms 
of ritual. The Roman religion, both as to the objects of 
religious homage, and the ceremonies and institutions of 
the system, underwent a vast expansion, in comparison with 
the primitive time when the deities were few, and were 
worshipped without the use of images. Yet the abstract 
character of the Roman gods, each fulfilling a certain func- 
tion, makes their religion less distantly removed from 
monotheism, or monism, in the pantheistic or theistic form, 
than that of the Greeks. 

Bunt the Greek religion had been undergoing, for several 
centuries before Christ, an amalgamation with the Roman. 
Rome was early brought into intercourse with the old 
Greek cities of Southern Italy, which at length were incor- 
porated under her rule. In the time of the Tarquins, the 
Sibylline books, which explained the rites proper to be 
practised in exigencies not provided for by the ordinary 
ritual, were introduced from Cumz. Also, the worship 
of Apollo was brought from this oldest of the Greek settle- 
ments, and acquired a constantly increasing influence until 
at length this Greek god, whose healing power was supposed 
to go forth upon the body and the spirit, received honors 
second only to those paid to Jupiter. In early times, the 
Romans had resorted to the oracle at Delphi for counsel ; 
and after the capture of Veii, they sent there a votive of- 
fering. Recognizing the Greeks as kinsmen, and identifying 
the Hellenic divinities with their own, they incorporated 
into their creed the myths and legends of the Greek my- 


124 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


thology, and, more and more, elements of the cultus asso- 
ciated with them. This fusion went on at a rapid pace in 
the two or three centuries that immediately preceded the 
Christian era. ΤῸ make the matter worse, it was only the 
shell of the old Greek religion that the Romans received. 
Losing their own religion, they received nothing real in 
exchange for it. The hollow, unbelieving spirit of the 
last age of the Republic was a verification of Cato’s pre- 
diction, that when that race gave Rome its letters, it would 
corrupt all things.’ Other causes conspired to undermine 
and degrade the Roman religion. The triumph of the 
Plebeians broke up the theocratical and patriarchal spirit / 
that had prevailed in the community of Romans and Sa- 
bines which had grown up on the banks of the Tiber. Re- 
ligion, like the state, imbibed a secular, worldly spirit. 4 
The decay and fall of the Roman religion date from the 
second Punic war; for up to this time the Hellenizing in- 
fluence had been kept within bounds, and the simple, 
austere type of the national cultus had not been given up. 
From this time, foreign rites, which had been repugnant 
to the feelings of former generations, pushed into Italy and 
Rome, in spite of the resistance of the better class of citi- 
zens. The cultivated class, having caught the skeptical 
spirit from the Greeks, came at last to the point of regard- 
ing the established religion as a necessary part of the civil 
constitution, as indispensable and valuable for the vulgar, 
but as entitled to no credence. Ennius, who was born 
39 B. C., to whom the Romans looked up as the father 
of their literature, made his countrymen acquainted with 
the theory of Euemerus; and this gained many adherents. 
The Roman literature, from the start, was the virtual ally 
of the skeptical tendency. The introduction of the Greek 
stage gave a finishing stroke to the separation of the liter- 


1See Becker and Marquardt, p. 80. 


THE DEIFICATION OF THE EMPERORS. 125 


ary and enlightened class from the popular creed. The 
representations in the theatre presented the old mythology 
in the characteristic features which rendered it absurd and 
incredible in the eyes of thinking men. The priests, in- 
stead of being chosen by their own body, were elected by 
the people. The spiritual offices became entirely secu- 
larized. They were filled by wealthy and ambitious citi- 
zens, who went through the prescribed ceremonies, as a | 
matter of official routine, with an outward decorum, but 
without the smallest degree of faith or sincerity. The two — 
main causes of the downfall of the old Roman faith were, | 
first, the influence of the skeptical speculations of the — 
Greeks, and, secondly, the political changes which robbed | 
ecclesiastical personages of all the sanctity which had pre- 
viously attached to them. 

The deification of the Emperors was a suitable climax to 
the progressive degradation of the religion of Rome. In 
oriental countries, kings had received divine honors, under 
the idea,.proper to despotism, that their power emanates 
directly from heaven. The hero-worship with which the 
Greeks and Romans were familiar, the belief in demons, 
an order of divinities concerned directly with the world, 
and the old Roman notion of genii, representatives of the 
gods, intermediate beings, exercising a divine guardianship 
and protection on earth, prepared the minds of men for 
this last act of servility, the apotheosis of their earthly 
rulers. Just as every individual was thought to have his 
genius who attended him invisibly from his birth through 
life, so there was a Genius Publicus—the guardian of the 
State—whose statue stood in the forum. Religious honors 
had been paid to genii; especially were there ceremonies 
of this kind on the birth-days of friends, or of individuals 
held in honor. Homage rendered to the genius of the 
Emperor was, therefore, natural to the Romans. It was a 


126 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


short step to identify the genius with the Emperor’s own 
person. Augustus, and the Emperors after him, at their 
death were consecrated—canonized, as it were—or raised 
to the rank of immortals who were entitled to divine 
honors. By a vote of the Senate, followed by solemn cere- 
monies, they were enthroned among the gods. An eagle, 
let loose from the funeral pile, and flying upward, symbol- 
ized the ascent of the deceased to the skies. A Senator 
who swore that he saw Augustus, on the occasion of his 
consecration, mount to heaven, just as Romulus was sup- 
posed to have ascended, was rewarded by Livia with a 
gift of money. Divine honors began to be rendered 
to Julius Cesar during his life-time. His birth-day 
and his victories were commemorated with religious 
services, a month was named for him, his bust was wor- 
shipped in the temple. After his death, sacrifices were 
offered up to him upon the altar. He was made a god, 
and went by the name of Divus Julius. The same kind of 
adulation was paid in larger measure to Augustus. A 
multitude of altars and temples arose in his honor in all 
parts of the Roman world. Especially in Greece and in the 
East, where the spirit of syeophancy was most rife, did the 
new cultus spread. Other members of the imperial family, 
women as well as men, received a like deification. The 
basest tyrants, like Nero and Commodus, were enthroned 
as objects of religious worship. ‘To this depth of degrada- 
tion the Roman religion had sunk. The worship of savage 
human tyrants was required by law. This was in keeping 
with the spirit which prompted the Senate, as Tacitus bit- 
terly narrates, to decree offerings at the temples on account 
of brutal murders perpetrated by the orders of Nero.’ 

A deep sense of justice and of the obligations of law, was 
native to the Roman mind. Hence there had been a 


1 Ann. xiv. 64. 


ROMAN SENSE OF JUSTICE. 127 


solemn faith ina moral government of the world. The 
Trojans in Virgil gave utterance to the sound Roman 
feeling, when they enforced their appeal for hospitality 
with the words :— 


“Si genus humanum, et mortalia temnitis arma, 
At sperate deos memores fandi atque nefandi.” 
Ain. i. 542-544. } 


The punishment of evil-doers was sure, whatever might 
be true of the rewards of the virtuous. These, the Greeks 
too had felt, were less certain than the penalties of wrong. 
Tacitus goes so far as to consider it proved by experience that 
the gods are not concerned about the protection of the inno- 
cent, but only about the punishment of the guilty. The 
power of conscience is manifested in numerous examples ; as 
in what the same historian says of the anguish of Tiberius. ὃ 
“We talk,” says Cicero, “as if all the miseries of man 
were comprehended in death, pain of body, sorrow of mind, 
or judicial punishment ; which I grant are calamitous acci- 
dents that have befallen many good men; but the sting of 
conscience, the remorse of guilt, is in itself the greatest 
evil, even exclusive of the external punishments that 
attend it.” * But Cicero expressed the fear that the loss 
of religious faith would so weaken conscience as to sap the 
foundations of ethical justice between man and man.° 

The Roman statesmen and scholars, in the age when 


1“ Butif menfolk and wars of men, ye wholly set at naught, 
Yet deem the Gods have memory still of good and evil wrought.” 
Σ᾽ ἜΠΙΞῚ: ἢ ro 3 Ann. vi. 6. 


* Morte, aut dolore corporis, aut luctu animi, aut offensione judicii, 
hominum miserias ponderamus ; que fateor humana esse, et multis bonis 
viris accidisse: scceleris est pcena tristis, et preter eos eventus qui se- 
quntur, per se ipsa maxima est.—De Legibus, ii. 18. 

6 Atque haud scio an, pietate adversus Deos sublata, fides etiam, et 


societas humani generis, et una excellentissima virtus, justitia, tollatur. 
—De Nat. Deorum, i. 2. 


128 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Christianity was introduced, looked on the popular religion 
as a political necessity, and defended, as well as practiced, 
the “ pious fraud” in dealing with the multitude on this 
subject. Varro, a contemporary and intimate friend of 
Cicero, and called by him the most acute and learned of 
men, in his great work, the Antiquities, entered very fully 
into the history and description of the Roman religion. 
Augustine, who re-echoes the laudation which Cicero be- 
stows on his erudition and acuteness, gives an account of 
his book, with copious extracts.’ Varro distinguished 
three kinds of religion, “ mythical, which the poets chiefly 
use ; physical, which the philosophers use ; and civil, which 
peoples use.” He did not scruple to comment on the 
unworthy and absurd character of myths and legends 
of the popular faith. He went as far as he could; 
Augustine says, as far as “he dared,” in this direction. 
The second kind of theology, the natural philosophy 
in its various schools, he describes without censure. 
Whatever sects it may give rise to, it lends no cre- 
dence to fables. Civil theology is that which the state 
ordains, the worship which the laws prescribe. This is 
described by Varro in all its minute ramifications. By 
this system citizens are toabide. Yet, as Augustine shows, 
the contents of the legal religion are, to a large extent, 
identical with those of the religion of the theatre, as Varro 
aptly designates the vulgar faith. Objections that lie 
against the one are equally valid against the other. Varro 
himself, in common with many others, believed in one 
deity, an impersonal spirit immanent in the world, and not 
separable from it. Scholars like him, Augustine truly 
observes, set forth, side by side, the fabulous and the civil 
system of religion. The “ former they dared to reject, the 
latter they dared not; the former they set forth to be cen- 


1 De Civ. Dei, Lib. vii. 


SKEPTICISM AMONG THE ROMANS. 129 


sured, the latter they showed to be very like it; not that 
it might be chosen to be held in preference to the other, 
but that it might be understood to be worthy of being re- 
jected together with it.” Seneca, who was born a century 
after the birth of Varro, avowed in the plainest terms his 

contempt for the civil theology. His expressions on this — 
subject we owe also to Augustine, as the work on Super- 
stition, from which they are cited, is not extant.’ Of the 
rites appointed by law, Seneca says: “All which things a 
wise man will observe as being commanded by the laws, 
but not as being pleasing to the gods.” “And what of 
this, that we unite the gods in marriage, and that not even 
naturally, for we join brothers and sisters? We marry 
Bellona to Mars, Venus to Vulcan, Salacia to Neptune, 
Some of them we leave unmarried, as though there were 
no match for them, which is surely needless, especially 
when there are certain unmarried goddesses, as Populonia, 
or Fulgora, or the goddess Rumina, for whom I am not 
astonished that suitors have been wanting.” To this Se- 
neca adds: “all that ignoble rabble of gods which the su- 
perstition of ages has heaped up, we shall adore in such a 
way as to remember that their worship belongs rather to 
custom than to reality.” The writings of Cicero are fruit- 
ful in illustrations of the prevalent skepticism. He twice 
refers to the witticism of Cato, who said that he did not see 
how the soothsayers could avoid laughing each other in 
the face. In Cicero’s treatise de Natura Deorum, Cotta, 
who is introduced as one of the interlocutors, an orator and 
magistrate of eminent standing, distinguishes in himself 
the character of a philosopher, and that’ of a priest. He 
says, that before inquiring into the nature of the gods, it is 
best to inquire whether there are gods or not; and on this 
point he says: “It would be dangerous, I believe, to take 


3 * De Civ. Dei, Lib. vi. 


130 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the negative side before a public auditory (in concione) ; 
but it is very safe in a conference of this kind and in this 
company.”’ In the first of the Tusculan Discussions occurs 
the dialogue between M, which stands either for Marcus, 
or Magister, and his Auditor: “M. Tell me, I beseech 
you, are you afraid of the three-headed Cerberus in the 
shades below, and the roaring waves of Cocytus, and the 
passage over Acheron, and Tantalus, expiring with thirst, 
while the water touches his chin, and Sisyphus 
“Who sweats with arduous toil in vain 
The steepy summit of the mount to gain.” 

Perhaps, too, you dread the inexorable judges, Minos and 
Rhadamanthus ; before whom neither L. Crassus nor M. 
Antonius can defend you; and where, since the cause lies 
before Grecian judges, you will not even be able to employ 
Demosthenes; but you must plead for yourself before a 
very great assembly. These things, perhaps, you dread, 
and, therefore, look on death as an eternal evil. A. Do 
you take me to be so imbecile as to give credit to such 
things? M. What? Do you not believe them? A. 
Not in the least. M. I am sorry to hear that. A. Why, 
I beg? M. Because I could have been very eloquent in 
speaking against them.”* Those who are familiar with 


1 Queritur primum in ea questione, que est de natura Deorum, sintne 
Dei, necne sint. Difficile est negare, credo, si in concione queratur; 
sed in hujusmodi sermone et consessu facillimum.—De Nat. Deorum i. 22. 

2M. Dic, queso, num te illa terrent? Triceps apnd inferos Cerberus? 
Cocyti fremitus? travectio Acherontis? 


‘Mento summam aquam attingens enectus siti, 
Tantalus, tum illud quod, 
‘Sisiphus versat 
Saxum sudans nitendo neque proficit hilum,’ 


fortasse etiam inexorabiles judices Minos et Rhadamanthus? apud 
quos nec te L. Crassus defendet, nec M. Antonius; nec, quoniam apud 
Grecos judices res agetur, poteris adhibere Demosthenen ; tibi ipsi pro te 


SKEPTICISM AMONG THE ROMANS. 131 


Sallust may recall the account which he gives of the debate 
in the Roman Senate on the question how Catiline should 
be punished. Julius Cesar opposed the infliction of capi- 
tal punishment, on the ground that death puts an end to 
pain, since beyond it there is no room either for anguish or 
joy.'| Both Cato and Cicero, in their speeches, refer to the 
doctrine of future retribution as an opinion held by the 
ancients, without attempting to defend it. 

It must be observed that skepticism. frequently did not 
stop short with the denial of the mythical divinities, and 
of the fables relating to them. It extended to the founda- 
tions of natural religion, the truth of the being of God and 
of a Providence The sneer of Pilate—what is Truth ?— 
expressed a prevalent feeling of cultivated men, that the 
attempt to ascertain anything certain on these things is 
vain—the fit pursuit of visionaries. There were those who 
mingled with their scorn for the popular credulity the 
acknowledgment of one God, whom, however, they stripped 
of personal attributes. It was a sort of materialistic Pan- 
theism. The elder Pliny, whatever may be his defects as 
a naturalist, and however inferior his work may be to kin- 
dred writings of Aristotle, was not only a man of unex- 
ampled industry, but also of a vigorous understanding. 
Near the beginning of his Natural History, he devotes a 
chapter to the subject of “God.” “ Whatever God be,” he 
says, “if there be any other God [than the world], and 
wherever he exists, he is all sense, all sight, all hearing, 
all life [totus anime] all mind [totus animi], and all 
within himself”? He asserts the folly of believing in 


erit maxima corona causa dicenda. Hee fortasse metuis, et idcirco 
mortem censes esse sempiternum malum. VI. A. Adeone me delirare 
censes, ut ista esse credam? M. Antu hee non credis? A. Minime 
vero. M. Male hercule narras. A. Cur, queso. M. Quia disertus esse 
possem, si contra ista dicerem. Tuscl. I. v. vi. 

1 Sallust, 8. σ. 50. ? Nat. Hist., 11. 5. 


132 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


gods, who are personified virtues, and vices, and even per- 
sonified diseases, and in the marriages, quarrels, foibles, and 
crimes which are ascribed to divinities. The deification 
of men is the best kind of worship. ‘ But,” he proceeds 
to say, ‘it is ridiculous to suppose, that the great head of 
all things, whatever it be, pays any regard to human af- 
fairs. Can we believe—or rather can there be any doubt, 
that it is not polluted by such a disagreeable and compli- 
cated office?” It is difficult to determine, he thinks, 
which opinion, that which admits a divine agency with 
reference to human affairs, or the utter denial of it, is 
most advantageous, so multiplied and foolish are the ex- 
travagances of superstition. Our skepticism respecting God 
is increased by the deification of Fortune, who has become 
the most popular of divinities, “ whom every one invokes.” 
“‘ We are so much in the power of chance, that chance it- 
self is considered as a God, and the existence of God be- 
comes doubtful.” “There are others,” Pliny goes on to 
observe, “ who reject this principle, and assign events to 
the influence of the stars, and to the laws of our nativity ; 
they suppose that God, once for all, issues His decrees, and 
never afterwards interferes. This opinion begins to gain 
ground, and both the learned and unlearned vulgar are 
falling into it. Hence we have the admonitions of thunder, 
the warnings of oracles, the predictions of soothsayers, and 
things too trifling to be mentioned, as sneezing and stumb- 
ling with the feet, reckoned among omens. The late Em- 
peror Augustus relates that he put the left shoe on the 
wrong foot, the day when he was near being assaulted by 
his soldiers.” Such things as these,” concludes Pliny, 
“so embarrass improvident mortals, that among all of them 
this alone is certain, that there is nothing more proud or 
more wretched than man.” The lower animals never 
think about glory, or money, or ambition, and, above all, 
they never reflect on death. 


SKEPTICISM AND SUPERSTITION. 5 


Skepticism, in the absence of a ruling caste, such as 
maintains an esoteric system in Oriental countries, could 
not be confined to officials and educated persons. It must 
betray its existence, and to some extent communicate itself 
to other classes, in the stir and ferment of Graeco-Roman 
society. To what extent had the leaven of unbelief thus 
worked its way downward into the lower ranks of society ? 
This is a question difficult to answer. Undoubtedly there 
is a striking contrast between the impression made by the 
literature, which reflects the tone of the cultivated class, 
and that pruduced by the sepulchral and votive inscrip- 
tions which emanate from all orders of men.’ If there be 
the spirit of incredulity in the one, there is, on the whole, 
in the other, the manifestation of an unquestioning faith. 
Yet, especially at the close of the Republican era, and 
prior to the reconstruction of society under the Emperors, 
skepticism had widely spread. Superstition followed in 
the wake of infidelity as its natural companion. The 
void left in the soul by the departure of the old faith was 
filled by new objects of belief, often more degraded than 
the old, which rushed in to fill its place. The eagerness 
of Romans for foreign rites, as the cultus of Isis and Sera- 
pis, which was partly due to this cause, prevailed in spite 
of efforts at legal suppression. Devotional practices and 
ceremonies, such as the old Romans would have despised, 
were imported from the East, and came into vogue. Ma- 
gicians, sorcerers, and necromancers, swarmed in every 
part of the empire, and drove a lucrative trade. They 
stood in the path of the first preachers of Christianity, as 
we see in the book of Acts, and in the early Fathers. At 
the same time, a consciousness, vague and undefined it 
might be, that the old religion was gradually losing ground, 
imparted a fanatical tinge to the struggles that were made 


1See Friedlander, Sittengeschichte Roms., iii. 423, 424. 


134 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


to uphold it. It was the bitterness that attends the defence 
of a sinking cause which is kept from downfall by artifi- 
cial props. 

The mischiefs and extravagances of superstition are de- 
picted by Plutarch, in his famous Essay on this subject. 
Plutarch, unlike Pliny, was a religious man. By means 
of his Platonic eclecticism, he could believe in one supreme 
Deity, and yet find room for gods and demons in the ca- 
pacity of subordinate agents. The tract, to which we refer, 
opens by affirming that from our ignorance of divine things 
there flow out two streams; “whereof the one in harsh and 
coarse tempers, as in dry and stubborn soils, produces 
atheism, and the other in the more tender and flexible, as 
in moist and yielding grounds, produces superstition.” 
Superstition has one disadvantage compared with atheism, 
that the latter is not attended with any passion or pertur- 
bation of mind. Its effect is rather frigidity and indiffer- 
ence. The superstitious man is under the distracting in- 
fluence of fear, and of a sort of fear that is attended with the 
dread of everything. It haunts him everywhere, whether 
he is awake or asleep, on the land or the sea. He flies to 
the next fortune-teller, or vagrant interpreter of dreams. 
He cannot use his reason when awake, nor dismiss his fears 
when asleep. Dreading the divine government as an in- 
exorable and implacable tyranny, he is yet unable to escape 
from its presence. He quivers at his preservers and benign 
benefactors. Even at the altars, to which men betake 
themselves to revive their courage, he is full of trembling. 
The atheist is blind, or sees amiss, but he is not subject to 
a frightful passion. He sees not the gods at all, while the 
superstitious man mistakes “ their benignity for terror, 
their paternal affection for tyranny, their providence for 
ernelty, and their frank simplicity for savageness and bru- 
tality.” Afraid of the gods, he still fawns upon them, 


THE REFORMS OF AUGUSTUS. 135 


and runs after them. He reviles himselfas an object of 
detestation to heaven. “God,” says Plutarch, “ is the brave 
man’s hope, and not the coward’s excuse.” Trust in him 
is inspiration to valor. A man would rather have his ex- 
istence denied altogether, than to be thought of as vin- 
dictive, fickle and unstable. It is the foul and senseless 
excesses of superstition that breed atheism in the beholders. 
We should flee from superstition, yet not rashly, ‘as people 
run from the incursions of robbers or from fire, and fall 
into bewildered and untrodden paths full of pits and preci- 
pices. For so some, while they would avoid superstition, 
leap over the golden mean of true piety into the harsh and 
coarse extreme of atheism.” ὦ 

Plutarch is one of the earliest representatives of that 
movement which aimed to find a via media between super- 
stition and unbelief, and to reconstruct paganism by placing 


under it a ‘monotheistic, or pantheistic foundation. A be- 
liever himself in the unity and personality of God, he ex- 
plained what was repulsive in the mythological les by the 
supposition of inferior demons, to whom much that had 
been attributed to the superior divinities was ascribed. In 
the second and third centuries, this general philosophical 
movement, which aimed at the rescue and elevation of the 
popular faith, secured many adherents among the educated 
heathen, and assumed the form of a reaction against the 
spread of Christianity. 

Augustus had undertaken religious reforms as a part of 
his general scheme for the renovation of society and the 
restoration of order. His efforts were naturally directed in 
the main towards the re-establishment of religious ob- 
servances. If this movement gained little sympathy in 
that frivolous and skeptical society, there were some, of 
whom Virgil may stand as an example, of a graver and 


1 De Superstit., 1, 3, 8, 14. 


136 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


more serious turn, who sincerely desired to infuse a fresh 
life into the ancient forms. In the second century, the in- 
fluence of philosophy, which inculeated in some form the 
divine unity, ard the influence due to the introduction of 
other, especially oriental, objects and methods of worship, 
conspired to produce in the cultivated classes an idea of the 
essential identity of the various religions. God was con- 
ceived of as one being under various names, and the mul- 
titude of divinities below the Supreme were taken as repre- 
senting the variety of His functions, or as subordinate in- 
struments of His Providence. The old rites were left un- 
altered, but a new meaning was attached to them. This 
late revival of Paganism in a philosophical form, accompa- 
nied as it often was with a real devoutness, constituted a 
formidable obstacle to the progress of the Christian faith. 
At the same time, however, the failure of heathenism un- 
der its improved aspect to afford precise and satisfactory 
solutions to the most important problems, operated to pre- 
pare many thoughtful minds for the reception of the Gos- 
pel. The change in the apprehension of the old system 
acted in opposite directions, now as an obstacle, and now as 
a help, to the religion of Christ. 
At no time was it a slight thing to break away from the 
old religion. To quote the language of Gibbon: “The in- 
numerable deities and rites of polytheism were closely inter- 
woven with every circumstance of business or pleasure, of 
public or private life; and it seemed impossible to escape 
the observance of them without, at the same time, re- 
nouncing the commerce of mankind, and all the offices and 
amusements of society.”! But the spread of skepticism 
rendered the abandonment of the old system easier. It is 
possible to exaggerate, and, as we have said before, it is 
difficult to estimate exactly, the extent of this feeling in the 


1 Ch. xv. (Smith’s ed., ii. 166.) 


MYTHOLOGY AND REVELATION. 137 


age of Cicero, and in that of Pliny. But this is clear, that 
the mythological religion had entered upon a process of de- 
cay and dissolution, which might, to be sure, be retarded 
by efforts on the side of conservatism, by ingenious com- 
binations and artificial explanations, but which must even- 
tually run its course. The superstition and unbelief to 
which we have referred are not indications of disease 
wholly; they are, likewise, indications of health. Super: 
stition might, it is true, arise from an evil conscience, and 
unbelief might result from the insensibility engendered by 
a profligate life. But, as they existed in the Roman world, 
they sprang, in great part, from the fact that the human 
mind had outgrown the polytheistic religion which the ima- 
gination of former ages had created, and was waiting for 
something better. Superstition testified to the need of ob- 
jects of faith, which lies deep in the heart, and which 
Christianity alone could satisfy. Skepticism arose from 
the insufficiency of the traditional beliefs to satisfy the 
craving of the spirit, ever reaching forth for some connec- 
tion with the supernatural world. Christianity could never 
be evolved out of this unsatisfied yearning of the soul; but 
it was a hunger and thirst which prepared many minds to 
receive with open hands the bread of life. 

In bringing to a close the two chapters in which we have 
considered the religion of the Greeks and Romans, a brief 
space may be given for an answer to the question: What 
relation of sympathy or affinity to Christian Revelation can 
the mythological religion sustain ? 

1. It was religion, The subjective sentiments which 


enter into religion, as fear, reverence, gratitude, dependence, 
adoration, the spirit of prayer and supplication to Deity, 


were there. These sentiments might lack purity, the ob- 
ject on which they should fasten might be, and was, very 
defectively conceived ; “yet there was worship, in its kind 


γ΄ 


ν 


ν 


138 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


often very earnest.” Plato, in the course of his fervent 
protest against Atheism, incidentally brings out this fact 
with impressive force. “I speak,” he says, “of those who 
will not believe the words which they have heard as babes 
and sucklings from their mothers and nurses, who used 
them as charms, both in jest and earnest, whom also they 
have heard and seen offering up sacrifices and prayers— 
sights and sounds delightful to children—of their parents 
‘sacrificing in the most earnest manner on behalf of them 
and of themselves, and with eager interest talking to the 
gods, and beseeching them, as though they were firmly 
convinced of their existence; moreover, they see and hear 
the genuflexions and prostrations which are made by Hel- 
lenes and barbarians to the rising and setting sun and 
moon, in all the various turns of good and evil fortune, 
not as if they thought that there were no gods, but as if 
there were no suspivion of their non-existence.” ὁ In the 
light of such a description, who can doubt that an ardent 
and genuine devotion, for ages long, in the case of a mul- 
titude of heathen, entered into their religious services? 
The myths not unfrequently embodied truth of the most 
exalted character. A gifted Christian scholar, speaking of 
the “beautiful and sublime fable in the Theogony, of the 
espousal by Zeus of Themis, the moral and physical go- 
vernment of the world, by whom he begot the Destinies ; 
and of Eurynome, of whom were born the Charites, “who 
lend a grace and charm to every form of life,” says: “He 
who does not here recognize religion, genuine, true religion, 
for him have Moses and the prophets written in vain.” ἢ 

2. There was a seeking after God in the heathen devo- 
tions. The subjective sentiments which belong to religion, 


1 Laws, x. 888 (Jowett, iv. 397). 
27K. O. Miller, Prolegomena, etc. (Engl. Trensl.), p. 186. 
5 Acts xvii. 27. 


MONOTHEISTIC TENDENCY IN HEATHENISM. 139 


could not reach their perfection of development, or meet 
with satisfaction, until the one object, worthy of them, who 
might be “ignorantly worshipped,” was revealed in his 
true attributes. There was thus an unfulfilled demand in 
the religious nature, which impelled the soul of the earnest 
worshipper on the path towards a goal that was hidden 
from his sight, prior to the Christian Revelation. 

3. The drift towards monotheism, which was due to the | 
necessities of moral and religious feeling, as well as to in- 
tellectual progress, is discerned from the Homeric days. 
If Zeus mingled in human affairs, often displaying weak- 
ness and folly, there was another conception of him, as one 
who dwells in ther, the father of gods and men, who 
flashes the lightning from the clouds, governs all, and ac- 
complishes all his will.’ More and more, as we advance 
towards the Christian era, the monotheistic tendency grows 
in strength. 

1 Compare K. O. Miiller, p. 186. 


140 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER V. 
THE GREEK PHILOSOPHY IN ITS RELATION TO CHRISTIANITY. 


THE Greek Philosophy was a preparation for Christi- 
anity in three ways. It dissipated, or tended to dissipate, 
the superstitions of polytheism; it awakened a sense of 
need which philosophy of itself failed to meet; and it so 
educated the intellect and conscience as to render the 
Gospel apprehensible, and, in many cases, congenial to 
the mind. It did more than remove obstacles out of the 
way ; its work was pusitive as well as negative. It origi- 
nated ideas and habits of thought which had more or less 
direct affinity with the religion of the Gospel, and which 
found in this religion their proper counterpart. The pro- 
phetic element of the Greek philosophy lay in the glimpses 
of truth which it could not fully discern, and in the obscure 
and unconscious pursuit of a good which it could not defi- 
nitely grasp. 

Socrates stands at the beginning of this movement. The 
preceding philosophy had been predominantly physical. 
It sought for an explanation of nature. The mystic, 
Pythagoras, blended with his natural philosophy moral 
and religious doctrine; but that doctrine, whatever it was, 
appears to have rested on no scientific basis. Socrates is 
the founder of moral science; and the whole subsequent 
course of Greek philosophy is traceable to the impulse 
which emanated from this sublime man. A parallel has 
more than once been drawn between Socrates and Jesus 
himself; nor are there wanting points of resemblance, 
which readily suggest themselves. More aptly was So- 


THE DOCTRINES OF SOCRATES. 141 


crates styled by Marsilius Ficinus, the Florentine Platonist 
of the Renaissance, the John the Baptist for the ancient world. 
Respecting the relation of Socrates and of his teaching to 
Christianity, the following points are worthy of notice :— 

1. The soul and its moral improvement was the great 
subject that employed his attention. He turned away from 
the study of material nature. He could not spare time for 
such inquiries ; they seemed to him unpractical,—which 
was not so strange a judgment, considering the physical 
theories that prevailed ; and they meddled with a province 
which it belonged to the gods to regulate. “As for him- 
self,” writes his loving disciple, Xenophon, “ man, and 
what related to man, were the only subjects on which he 
chose to employ himself. ΤῸ this end, all his inquiries and 
consideration turned upon what was pious, what impious ; 
what honorable, what base ; what just, what unjust; what 
wisdom, what folly ; what courage, what cowardice ; what 
a state_or political community,” and the like.’ His great 
maxim —“ know thyself”— called the individual to look 
within himself in order to become acquainted with his de- 
ficiencies, duties, and responsibilities. ΤῸ probe the con- 
ceited and shallow, expose them to themselves, and by that 
process of interrogation which he called “ midwifery,” 
to elicit clear and tenable thinking, was his daily employ- 
ment. Euthydemus,an ambitious young man, who thought 
himself fitted for the highest public office, after being 
examined by Socrates, ‘‘ withdrew,” Xenophon says, “ full 
of confusion and contempt of himself, as beginning to 
perceive his own insignificance.” ? “ Many,” Xenophon 

1 αὐτὸς δὲ περὶ τῶν ἀνθρωπείων ἂν ἀεὶ διελέγετο, σκοπῶν, τί εὐσεβές, τί ἀσεβές" 
τί καλόν, τί αἰσχρόν" τί δίκαιον, τί ἄδικον" τί σωφροσύνη, τί μανία" τί ἀνδρεία, 
tl δειλία" τί πόλις, τί πολιτικός. τί ἀρχὴ ἀνϑρώπων, τί ἀρχικὸς ἀνϑρώπων, 
καὶ περὶ τῶν ἄλλων, ete.—Mem., I. i. 16. 

2 Καὶ πάνυ ἀϑύμως ἔχων ἀπῆλϑε καὶ καταφρονῆσας ἑαυτοῦ καὶ νομίσας τῷ 
ὄντι ἀνδράποδον elvar.—_Mem., IV. ii. 39. 


142 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


adds, “ who were once his followers, had forsaken him”! 
for this very reason that he laid bare their self-sufficiency, 
and their other faults. Who can fail to be reminded of the 
pestdvoca—the self-judgment and reform—which were re- 
quired at the very first preaching of the Gospel ? 

2. Socrates asserted the doctrine of Theism, and taught 
and exemplified the spiritual nature of religion. It is 
true that he believed in “gods many and lords many.” 
But he believed in one supreme, personal being, to whom 
the deepest reverence was to be paid. He presents the 
argument from design for the existence of God, appeal- 
ing to the structure of the human body, and of the eye in 
particular, and to the various instances of adaptation in 
nature, precisely in the manner of Paley and other Chris- 
tian writers. He argues with Aristodemus to show him 
the folly, being conscious of reason and intelligence him- 
self, of supposing that there is no intelligence elsewhere. 
How irrational to disbelieve in the gods, because he can- 
not see them, when he admits the reality of his own soul, 
which is invisible!? In looking at a book of Anaxagoras, 
Socrates had been struck with pleasure in finding that he 
admitted a supreme intelligence—vov¢ ; but he was pro- 
portionately disappointed in discovering that nothing was 
said to be done by this being, except to give the initial 
motion to matter.* He taught the truth of a universal 
Providence. ‘He was persuaded,” says Xenophon, “that 
the gods watch over the actions and affairs of men in a 
way altogether different from what the vulgar imagined ; 
for while these limited their knowledge to some particulars 
only, Socrates, on the contrary, extended it to all; firmly 
persuaded that every word, every action, nay, even our 


1 Πολλοὶ μὲν οὖν τῶν οὕτω διατεϑέντων ὑπὸ Σωκράτους οὐκέτε αὐτῷ προσ. 
ήἤεσαν.---ΤὈ14., ¢ 40. 
?Mem., I. iv. 2 seq. 5 Tbid. 


THE DOCTRINES OF SOCRATES. 143 


most retired deliberations, are open to their view; that 
they are everywhere present, and communicate to mankind 
all such knowledge as relates to the conduct of human 
life.” Ἠδ had only one prayer, that the gods would give 
him those things that were good, of which they alone were 
the competent judges. ΤῸ ask for gold, silver, or power, 
was to seek for a doubtful advantage. The poor man’s 
gift was as acceptable to heaven, as the offerings of the 
wealthy. “ The service,” he said, “ paid to the Deity by the 
pure and pious soul, is the most grateful sacrifice.” ? 
Not only as to offerings, but also as to all other things, 
he had no better advice to give to his friends, than 
that “they should do all things according to their abil- 
ity.” * He counseled absolute obedience to the Deity, 
and acted on this principle. It was no more possible to 
induce him to go counter to any intimation from the Deity 
respecting what should or should not be done, than to 
make him desert a clear, well-instructed guide for one 
who is ignorant and blind. He looked with contempt, 
writes his faithful disciple, upon “all the little arts of 
human prudence,” when placed in comparison with di- 
vine counsels and admonitions.’ He chose his career in 
compliance with an inward call from God, which he did 
not feel at liberty to disregard. He abstained from any 
proposed action when he felt himself checked by a feeling 
within, which he considered to be the voice of the demon, or 

1 καὶ γὰρ ἐπιμελεῖσθαι θεοὺς ἐνόμιζεν ἀνθρώπων, οὐχ bv τρόπον οἱ πολλοὶ 
νομίζουσιν. οὗτοι μὲν γὰρ οἴονται τοὺς θεοὺς τὰ μὲν εἰδέναι, τὰ δ᾽ οὐκ εἰδέναι. 
Σωκράτης δὲ πάντα μὲν ἡγεῖτο θεοὺς εἰδέναι, τά τε λεγόμενα καὶ πραττόμενα 
καὶ τὰ σιγῇ βουλευόμενα, πανταχοῦ δὲ παρεῖναι, καὶ σημαίνειν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις 
περὶ τῶν ἀνθρωπείων ravTov.—Mem., I. i. 19. 

3. Αλλ᾽ ἐνόμιζε τοὺς θεοὺς ταῖς παρὰ τῶν εὐσεβεστάτων τιμαῖς μάλιστα 
yaipew.—Mem., I. iii. 3. 

’Mem., I. iii. 3. 4 Mem., I. iii. 4. 


5 Αὐτὸς dé πάντα τανϑρώπινα ὑπερεώρα πρὸς τὴν παρὰ τῶν ϑεῶν ξυμβου- 
Aiav.—Mem., I. iii. 4. 


144 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


spirit, that attended him. These things belong to the cha- 
racter of Socrates; but, in this case, character and conduct are 
not to beseparated from teaching. His spirit is well shown 
in the beautiful story of the Choice of Hercules, which he 
narrates to Aristippus, whom he would persuade to lead a 
manly and virtuous life.’ There is reason to think that 
the “Apology” reports with substantial truth what So- 
crates said to his judges. After explaining how his plain 
dealing, in exposing to men their defects, and in unveiling 
false pretensions, made him many enemies, he says that he 
lamented this fact; “but,” he adds, “necessity was laid 
upon me,—the word of God, I thought, ought to be consi- 
dered first.”* His immovable fidelity to his convictions 
of right was connected with his profound faith in the mo- 
ral government of the world, and in the care of God for 
His servants. “A man”—so he spoke to his judges — 
“a man who is good for any thing ought not to calculate 
the chance of living or dying; he ought only to consider 
whether in doing any thing, he is doing right or wrong— 
acting the part of a good man, or of a bad.”* “ Be of good 
cheer about death, and know this of a truth—that no evil 
can happen to a good man, either in life, or after death. 
He and his are not neglected by the gods; nor has my own 
approaching end happened by mere chance. But I see 
clearly that to die and be released was better for me; and 
therefore the oracle”—that is, the demon who imparted 
only negative monitions—“ gave no sign.” ἡ 


1 Mem., II. i. 

2 ὅμως δὲ ἀναγκαῖον ἐδόκει εἶναι τὸ τοῦ ϑεοῦ περὶ πλείστου ποιεῖσϑαι. 21 
E.—(Jowett, i. 336). 

3 Οὐ καλῶς λέγεις, ὦ ἄνϑρωπε, εἰ, οἴει δεῖν κίνδυνον ὑπολογίζεσϑαι τοῦ ζῆν 
ἢ τεϑνάναι ἄνδρα, ὅτου τι καὶ σμικρὸν ὄφελός ἐστιν, ἀλλ᾽ οὐκ ἐκεῖνο μόνον 
σκοπεῖν, ὅταν πράττῃ τι, πότερον δίκαια ἣ ἄδικα πράττει, καὶ ἀνδρὸς ἀγαϑοῦ 
ἔργα ἢ κακοῦ. 28 B.—(Jowett, i. 343). 


“᾽Αλλὰ καὶ ὑμᾶς χρή, ὦ ἄνδρες δικασταί, εὐέλπιδας εἶναι πρὸς τὸν ϑάνατον, 


THE DOCTRINES OF SOCRATES. 145 


3. Socrates had a belief, though not a confident belief, 
in the future life and in the immortality of thesoul. In the 
“ Apology,” he refrains from any positive, dogmatic utter- 
ance on this subject. The fear of death is unwise, “since 
no one knows whether death,” which is apprehended as 
the greatest evil, ‘‘may not be the greatest good.”* Such 
a dread implies a conceit of knowledge. He argues that 
either death is unconsciousness and a state of nothingness, 
an eternal sleep, or, for the good, a companionship with 
noble and glorious beings who have gone before us; and 
that, in either event, it is no evil. The last word in his 
address is: “‘The hour of departure has arrived, and we go 
our ways—I to die, and you to live. Which is better, 
God only knows.” ? But his last words to his friends were 
—for on this point we may trust the Phedo—a direction 
to make an offering for him to the god of healing, which 
implies an expectation of a blessing in store for him in 
another state of being. ? 


4, In the ethical doctrine of Socrates, virtue is identi- 
fied with knowledge, with the discernment of the highest 
good. This is evident from the reports of Xenophon, 
as well as from Plato. No action was truly righteous 
that was not consciously so,—done, not from mechanical 


καὶ ἕν τι τοῦτο διανοεῖσθαι ἀληϑές, OTe οὐκ ἔστιν avdpt ἀγαϑᾷ κακὸν οὐδὲν 
οὔτε ζῶντι οὔτε τελευτήσαντι, οὐδὲ ἀμελεῖται ὑπὸ ϑεῶν τὰ τούτου πράγματα: 
οὐδὲ τα ἐμὰ νῦν ἀπὸ τοῦ αὐτομάτου γέγονεν, ἀλλά μοι δῆλόν ἐστι τοῦτο, ὅτι 
ἤδη τεϑνάναι καὶ ἀπηλλάχϑαι πραγμάτων βέλτιον ἣν μοι. διὰ τοῦτο καὶ ἐμὲ 
οὐδαμοῦ ἀπέτρεψε τὸ σημξιον---41 C, D (Jowett, i. 355). 


1 Olde μὲν γὰρ οὐδεὶς τὸν θάνατον οὐδ᾽ εἰ τυγχάνει τῷ ἀνθρώπῳ πάντων μέγ- 
ἐστον ὃν τῶν ἀγαϑῶν, δεδίασι δ᾽ ὡς εὖ εἰδότες, ὃτι μέγιστον τῶν κακῶν ἐστι. 
Apol. 29 A. (Jowett, i. 343). 

2 ᾿Αλλὰ yap ἤδη ὥρα ἀπιέναι, ἐμοὶ μὲν ἀποθανουμένῳ, ὑμῖν δὲ βιωσομένοις͵ 
ὁπότεροι δὲ ἡμῶν ἔρχονται ἐπὶ ἄμεινον πρᾶγμα, ἄδηλον παντὶ πλὴν ἢ τῷ θεᾷ, 
42. (Jowett, i, 316). 

5 Pheed., 118. 


146 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


habit, but with a perception of its moral quality. More- 
over, the perception of virtue could not fail to be at- 
tended with the practice of it. None who saw the highest 
good, would fail to choose it. It is probable that Socrates 
had in mind a theory like that of Locke who makes the 
will follow the last dictate of the understanding, or like 
that of Jonathan Edwards, that the will is as the greatest 
apparent good. Whatever is preferred is looked upon 
in the light of a good. Xenophon, in one place, states 
the doctrine in this way: “ Socrates made no distinction 
between wisdom and a virtuous temper; for he judged 
that he who so discovered what things are laudable and 
good, as to choose them, what evil and base, as to avoid 
them, was both wise and virtuously tempered.” ὁ Never- 
theless, the doctrine of Socrates, which Aristotle, also, 
attributes to him, would, if logically carried out, resolve 
virtue into an intellectual state, and subvert the ground 
of moral accountableness for evil-doing. It is plain that 
Socrates, notwithstanding counter elements in his teaching, 
and his practical earnestness, unwittingly laid the founda- 
tion of that intellectualism which made the highest 
spiritual attainments accessible only to the gifted few,— 
a spirit which pervaded the schools of Greek philosophy 
afterwards. His aim was a worthy one, to impart to 
ethics a scientific character ; as it was his aim, generally, 
to rescue objective truth from the skepticism that would 
convert all verities into subjective notions, or feelings. 
Yet Socrates was personally far from disposed to ex- 
aggerate the intellectual powers of man, or to overlook the 
limits of human reason. On the contrary, he was cha- 


1 Σοφίαν δὲ καὶ σωφροσύνην οὗ διώριζεν, ἀλλὰ Tov τὰ μὲν καλά τε Kat ἀγαθὰ 
γιγνώσκοντα χρῆσθαι αὐτοῖς, καὶ τὸν τὰ αἰσχρὰ εἰδότὰ εὐλαβεῖσθαι, σοφόν τε 
καὶ σώφρονα éxpivev.— Mem., III. ix. 4. For further illustrative passages, 
see Ueberweg, Hist. of Phil., i. 85. 


THE DOCTRINES OF PLATO. 147 


racterized by a genuine humility. The Pythian prophetess 
had called him the wisest of men. He could explain this 
laudation only by the reflection that he was conscious of 
his ignorance. After talking with a politician, he said to 
himself: “ He knows nothing, and thinks that he knows. 
1 neither know nor think that I know. In this latter 
particular, then, I seem to have slightly the advantage of 
him.” ' After plying others with questions, he was led to 
the same conclusion. Simmias, in the Pheedo, says that 
one who cannot learn the truth about the great matters 
connected with the soul and the future life, must take the 
best of human notions as a raft on which to sail through 
life, “if he cannot find some word of God which will more 
surely and safely carry him.”? This reference to a possi- 
ble divine revelation is quite in the Socratic spirit. 


In passing to Plato, we do not leave Socrates ; but it is 
not possible to draw the line, in the Platonic Dialogues, be- 
tween the teaching of the master, and the ideas and opinions 
of the more speculative disciple. The elevated tone of the 
Platonic system, and its many points of congeniality with 
Christian truth, have always been recognized in the Church. 
Men like Origen and Augustine, among the Fathers, were 
imbued with the Platonic spirit. Not a few, as far back 
as Justin Martyr and as late as Neander, have found in the 
pure and lofty teaching of Plato a bridge over which they 
have passed into the kingdom of Christ. Turn where we will 
in these immortal productions, we are in the bracing at- 
mosphere of a spiritual philosophy. We touch on some of 
the most important points which invite comparison with 
Christian doctrine. 


1 Apol., 21 (Jowett, 1. 335). 
2__ ei μῇ τις δύναιτο ἀσφαλέστερον Kat ἀκινδυνότερον ἐπὶ BeBatorépon 
ὀχήματος ἢ λόγου θείου τινὸς διαπορευθῆναι, Phed., 85 (Jowett, I. 434). 


(48 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


1. Plato’s conception of God approaches but does not 
attain to that of Christianity. His sense of the mystery 
that surrounds the divine being is expressed in the 
Timeeus, where he asks: “ How can we find out the Father 
and Maker of all the universe? Or when we have found 
him, how shall we be able to speak of him to all men?” ? 
Plato teaches that God is a Person, a self-conscious intel- 
ligence. No other interpretation of his doctrine can be 
consistently applied to his various utterances on the subject. 
When, in the Republic, he refers to the idea of the good 
as “ that which imparts truth to the object and knowledge 
to the subject,” ? he is setting forth the final cause, which 
is also the moving spring, of divine action, and of human 
action so far as it is rational. In the Philebus, he speaks 
of Zeus as possessed of the mind and soul of a king, and 
affirms that mind rules the universe. * It is impossible to 
doubt his profound earnestness, when, in the tenth book 
of the Laws, he speaks of the “ lost and perverted natures ” 
who have adopted atheism, and describes it as a notion 
which superficial youth may take up, but which, as men 
advance in life, they abandon. It is with moral indigna- 
tion that he comments on this disbelief in the existence of 
Deity, and on the skepticism which dreams that the gods 
stand aloof from human affairs, or can be bribed by offer- 
ings to withhold the retribution that is due to sin—as if they 

1 τὸν μὲν οὖν ποιητὴν καὶ πατέρα τοῦδε τοῦ παντὸς εὐρεῖν τε ἔργον καὶ εὑ- 
ρόντα εἰς πάντας ἀδύνατον Aéyerv.—Timeeus, 28 (Jowett, 11. 624). 

2 Τοῦτο τοίνυν τὸ τὴν ἀλήϑειαν παρέχον τοῖς γεγνωσκομένοις καὶ τῷ γιγνώσκοντι 
τὴν δύναμιν ἀποδιδὸν τὴν τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ ἰδέαν φάθι εἷναι.----Ψ1]. 508 (Jowett, ii. 
844). The interpretation given above seems to be most consistent with 
Plato’s other teachings. By some the idea of the good is identified abso- 
lutely with God. See Butler’s Lectures on Ancient Phil., ii. 62, but also 
Thompson’s Note. See, also, Ritter, Hist. of Ane. Phil., ii. 284. For 
other views of the passage, see Zeller, Glesch. d. Griech. Phil., ii. 208, 


309, 310. 
5 Phileb., 30. 


THE DOCTRINES OF PLATO, 149 


were ready to share with a robber his spoils. His doctrine 
is that an inward affinity between us and the gods leads 
us to believe in them and honor them.’ But Plato did not 
escape from the dualism which clung to Greek as well as to 
Oriental thinking. Matter is eternal, and is an independent 
and a partially intractable material. God fashions, He does 
not create, the world. Then, side by side with the Supreme 
Being, is the realm of ideas, the patterns and archetypes of 
whatever comes to be, and which, it is clear not only from 
Plato himself, but also from the polemical attitude of Aris- 
totle, are conceived of as substantial entities. By thus assign- 
ing to the ideas a kind of separate existence, Plato gave room 
and occasion for the pantheistic turn which his system as- 
sumed in the hands of professed Platonists of a later day. 


Recognizing the gods of the popular creed, Plato dis- 
carded as false and impious the myths which attributed to 
them infirmities and crimes, and he would banish from the 
ideal Republic the poets who related these revolting stories. 
In the beautiful dialogue at the opening of the Pheedrus, 
Socrates, who reclines upon the sloping grass, in the 
shadow of “a lofty and spreading plane-tree,” on the 
margin of the Ilissus, and with his feet resting in its cool 
water, explains to his companions his reasons for rejecting 
the rationalistic solutions of Euemerus. 

Of divine Providence, so far as the care of the individual 
is concerned, it is enough to quote this passage from the 
Republic, which sounds like Apostolic teaching: ‘‘ This 
must be our notion of the just man, that even when he is 
in poverty, or sickness, or any other seeming misfortune, 
all things will in the end work together for good to him, 
in life and death: for the gods have a care of any one 
whose desire is to become just and to be like God, as far as 


1 Leges, x. 899 (Jowett, iv. 411). 


150 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


man can attain his likeness, by the pursuit of virtue.” ἢ 
This faith in Providence led to the condemnation of suicide. 
Man has a post assigned him by heaven, and he has no 
right to desert it on account of any hardship that he suffers. 
“The gods are our guardians,” says Socrates, “and we are 
a possession of theirs.”? When one remembers how the 
opposite doctrine prevailed among the Stoics, one is struck 
with the deep religious feeling of Plato. But we miss in 
him, as in the ancient philosophers generally, any concep- 
tion of the final cause of history, of a goal to which the 
course of history tends, such as we have in the Christian 
idea of the kingdom of God on earth; and hence there is 
wanting a broad and satisfying conception of the Providence 
of God as related to mankind. Hellenic pride, the Greek 
feeling of superiority to the barbarian, was one thing which 
stood in the way of an ampler idea of the plan of God re- 
specting the human race. Plato was not emancipated from 
this feeling. But, independently of all prejudice, the means 
of arriving at a larger view were not present on the plane 
of ancient heathenism. Here was a limitation which Plato 
could not surmount; but as to the moral government of 
God, under which the good are rewarded and the evil 
chastised and punished, both in this world and in the world 
to come—this is a conviction with which his mind is _pro- 
foundly impressed. The rewards and punishments which 
we receive here, he says, are nothing “in comparison with 

1 Οὕτως ἄρα ὑποληπτέον περὶ τοῦ δικαίου ἀνδρός, ἐάν τ᾽ ἐν πενίᾳ γίγνη- 
ται ἐάν τε ἐν νόσοις ἤ τινι ἄλλῳ τῶν δοκούντων κακῶν, ὡς τούτᾳ ταῦτα εἰς 
ἀγαϑόν τι τελευτήσει, ζῶντι ἢ καὶ ἀποθανόντι. ov γὰρ δὴ ὑπό γε ϑεῶν 
ποτὲ ἀμελεῖται ὃς ἂν προϑυμεῖσϑαι ἐϑέλῃ δίκαιος γίγνεσϑαι καὶ ἐπιτηδεύων 
ἀρετὴν εἰς ὅσον δυνατὸν ἀνϑρώπῳ ὁμοιοῦσϑαι ϑεῷ.---Χ, 613 (Jowett, ii. 455). 

2 τὸ ϑεόν τε εἶναι τὸν ἐπιμελούμενον ἡμῶν καὶ ἡμᾶς ἐκείνου κτήματα εἶναι. 
Phed., 62 (Jowett, i. 406). 

3 Plato’s objection to the distinction of Hellenes and Barbarians, in 


the Politicus (262), is on a logical ground; just as, in the context, he 
objects to the distinction of men and animals. 


PLATO ON THE SOUL. 151 


those other recompenses which await both the just and the 
unjust after death.” * 

2. Plato teaches the super-terrestrial properties and des- 
tiny of the soul. Man is possessed of a principle of 
intelligence—-vovc—-and is thus in the image of God. 
In a beautiful passage of the Pheedo, the notion is confuted 
that the soul is a mere harmony of parts or elements, sub- 
ject to the affections of the body. Rather is it a nature 
which leads and masters them—“ herself a diviner thing 
than any harmony.’’? The soul is immortal. The inward 
life is “the true self and concernment of a man.”? “Let 
each one of us,” says Plato, “leave every other kind of 
knowledge, and seek and follow one thing only, if perad- 
venture he may be able to learn and find also who there is 
that can and will teach him to distinguish the life of good 
and evil, and to choose always and everywhere the better 
life as far as possible.”* There are two patterns before 
men, the one blessed and divine, the other godless and 
wretched. It is utter folly and infatuation to grow like 
the last. We are to cling to righteousness at whatever 
sacrifice. ‘No man,” says Plato, “but an utter fool and 
coward is afraid of death itself, but he is afraid of doing 
wrong. For, to go to the world below, having a soul 
which is like a vessel full of injustice, is the last and worst 


1 Ταῦτα τοίνυν, ἦν δ᾽ ἐγώ, οὐδέν ἐστι πλήϑει οὐδὲ μεγέϑει πρὸς ἐκεῖνα ἃ 
τελευτήσαντα ἑκάτερον Tmepiéver.—Rep., x. 614 (Jowett, ii. 456). 


2 Pheed., 94 (Jowett, i. 444). 


3 -αἀλλὰ περὶ τὴν ἐντὸς ὡς ἀληϑῶς, περὶ ἑαυτὸν καὶ τὰ éavrov.—Rep. 


iv. 443 (Jowett, ii. 274). 


*_uddiota ἐπιμελητέον ὅπως ἕκαστος ἡμῶν τῶν ἄλλων μαϑημάτων ἀμελήσας 
τούτου τοῦ μαϑήματος καὶ ζητητὴς καὶ μαϑητὴς ἔσται, ἐάν ποϑεν οἷός τ᾽ ἢ 
μάϑεϊν καὶ ἐξευρεῖν τίς αὐτὸν ποιήσει δυνατὸν καὶ ἐπιστήμονα, βίον καὶ χρη- 
στὸν καὶ πονηρὸν διαγιγνώσκοντα, τὸν βελτίω ἐκ τῶν δυνατῶν αἐὶ πανταχοῦ 


aipeiodar.—Rep. x. 618 (Jowett, ii. 461). 


152 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


of all evils.”! He goes so far, in a remarkable passage in 


the Gorgias, as to say that a righteous man, if he has done 
wrong, will prefer to be punished rather than deprive justice 
of her due. ‘The next best thing to a man being just, 
is that he should become just, and be chastised and 
punished.”? No Christian preacher can be more solemn 
and earnest than Socrates in what he is represented in the 
Pheedo as saying relative to the duty of caring for the 
spiritual part of our being. “O my friends,” he said, “if 
the soul is really immortal, what care should be taken of 
her, not only in respect of the portion of time which is 
called life, but of eternity! And the danger of neglecting 
her from this point of view does indeed appear to be 
awful.”? The soul, it is urged, takes nothing with her into 
the other world but her nurture and education. The 
thought is like that of the Apostle—we brought nothing 
into the world, and take nothing out.* No Christian mo- 
ralist can be more severe in his rebukes of the sensual, who 
‘fatten, and feed and breed,’ and “fill themselves with 
that which is not substantial.” ὅ 

3. Plato insists on the need of redemption. In one 
place he compares the soul, in its present condition, “ dis- 
figured by a thousand ills,” to the sea-god Glaucus, “ whose 


1 αὐτὸ μὲν yap τὸ ἀποθνήσκει" οὐδεὶς φοβεῖται, ὅστις μὴ παντάπασιν ἀλόγιστός 
τε καὶ ἄνανδρός ἐστι, τὸ δὲ ἀδικεῖν φοβεῖται: πολλῶν γάρ ἀδικημάτων γέμοντα 
τὴν ψυχὴν εἰς “Αἰδου ἀφικέσϑαι πάντων ἔσχατον κακῶν éottv.—Gorgias, 522 
E. (Jowett, ili. 121). 

2 ἐὰν δέ τις κατά TL κακὸς γίγνηται, κολαστέος ἐστί, Kai τοῦτο δεύτερον ἀγα- 
ϑὸν μετὰ τὸ εἶναι δίκαιον, τὸ γίγνεσϑαι καὶ κολαζόμενον διδόναι δίκην.---(ἀοτ- 
gias, 527, B. (Jowett, ili. 125). 

3 "Αλλὰ τόδε γ᾽, ἔφη, ὦ ἄνδρες, δίκαιον διανοηϑῆνα:, Ste εἴ περ ἡ ψυχὴ 
ἀϑάνατος ἐστιν, ἐπιμελείας δὴ δεῖται οὐχ ὑπὲρ τοῦ χρόνου τούτου μόνον ἔν ὦ 
καλοῦμεν τὸ ζῇν, ἀλλ᾽ ὑπὲρ τοῦ παντὸς, καὶ ὁ κίνδυνος νῦν δὴ καὶ δόξειεν ἂν 
δεινὸς εἷναι, ἐΐ τις αὐτῆς Guedjoer.—Pheed., 107 (Jowett, i. 458). 

Aime vas ἡ. 


5 Rep., ix. 586 (Jowett, ii. 426). 


PLATO’S IDEA OF REDEMPTION. 153 


original image can hardly be discerned because his natural 
members are broken off, and crushed, and in many ways 
damaged by the waves, and incrustations have grown over 
them of sea-weed, and shells, and stone, so that he is liker 
to some sea-monster than to his natural form.”! But 
Plato’s idea of the nature of redemption is faulty from the 
defect that belongs to his notion of sin. Redemption is 
not strictly moral, the emancipation of the will from the 
control of evil, although this element is not ignored; but 
it is the purification of the soul from the pollution sup- 
posed to be inevitable from its connection with matter. 
The spirit is to be washed from the effect of its abode in 
the body, its contact with a foreign, antagonistic element 
that defiles it. And what is the method of redemption? 
Sin being conceived of as ignorance, as an infatuation of 
the understanding, deliverance is through instruction, 
through science. Hence the study of Arithmetic and 
Geometry is among the remedies prescribed for the disorder 
of human nature. The intellect is to be corrected in its 
action. The reliance is predominantly upon teaching. 
Thus, Plato, through his dualism on the one hand, and 
the exaggerated part which he gives to the understanding 
in connection with moral action, on the other, fails to 
apprehend exactly both the nature of sin, and of salvation. 

4. There is a Christian idea at the bottom of Plato’s 
ethical system. Virtue he defines as resemblance to God 
according to the measure of our ability.? To be like God 
Christianity declares to be the perfection of human cha- 
racter. But there was wanting to the heathen mind, even 
in its highest flight, that true and full perception of the 
divine excellence which is requisite for the adequate reali- 
zation of this ethical maxim. We cannot but wonder at 


ade x. 612 (Jowett 11. 454). 
2 --ὁμοίωσις ϑεῷ κατὰ τὸ dvvarév,—Theext., 176 A (Jowett, iii. 400). 


154 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


hearing Plato say, almost by inspiration: “In God is no 
unrighteousness at all—He is altogether righteous ; and 
there is nothing more like Him than he of us who is most 
righteous.” “Τὸ become like Him is to become holy, just, 
and wise.” ' Yet, with Plato, justice is the crowning vir- 
tue, the highest attribute of character. It is Justice which 
keeps all the powers of the soul in harmony, and connected 
with this regnant virtue are Wisdom, Courage, and Tem- 
perance, corresponding respectively to the several functions, 
reason, the will with the higher impulses of the spirit, 
and the appetitive nature. Plato has only an occasional 
glimpse of the higher principle of Love, which Chris- 
tianity makes the sum and source of moral excellence; it 
does not enter as an essential link in his system.? 

Moreover, the possession of virtue in the highest sense 
is possible only to the philosopher. And Plato says 
that the philosophic nature is a plant that rarely grows 
among men.? In the ideal commonwealth, it is only the few 
who are endowed with philosophic reason. It is their pre- 
rozative to rule the many; and it is only the few who are 
capable of realizing the moral ideal in its perfection. How 
opposed is this to the Gospel, which offers the heavenly 
good to all! The idea of an intellectual aristocracy, with 
respect to which Plato stands on the common level of ancient 
thought, is made somewhat less repulsive by the duty which 
is laid upon the philosopher of descending “ into the den,” 4 
and working among men, laboring “to make their ways as 
far as possible agreeable to the ways of God.” ὅ 

1Tbid. (Jowett, ili. 400). 

*The Symposium, which, though difficult of analysis, contains pass- 
ages of great beauty, shows how far he went in this direction. 

8 Republic, B. vi. (Jowett, ii. 324). 

4 —rdhw καταβαίνειν παρ᾽ ἐκείνους τοὺς δεσμώτας. Rep. vii. 519 (Jow- 
ett, 11. 353). 

5 fue dy ὅτε μάλιστα ἀνθρώπεια ἤϑη εἰς ὅσον ἐνδέχεται ϑεοφιλῆ ποιήσειαν, 


Repub., vi. 501 (Jowett, ii. 335). 


PLATO’S REPUBLIC. 155 


Plato’s Republic offers the finest illustration uf the lofti- 
ness of his aspirations, and, at the same time, of the barriers 
which it was impossible for him to overpass. This work 
gives evidence of the yearning of his mind for a more in- 
timate union and fellowship of men than had _ hitherto 
existed. How could this aspiration be realized ? The only 
form of society in which he could conceive it possible for 
such a community to come into being, was the State. And, 
in order to give effect to his conception, individuality must 
be lost in the all-controlling influence and sway of the 
social whole. Plato says that in the best ordered state there 
will be a common feeling, such as pervades the parts of the 
human body ; he uses the very figure of St. Paul when he 
says of Christians that they are members one of another. 
But this relation could never be produced by any form of 
political society. Besides this insurmountable difficulty, 
Plato does not escape from the pride of race. It is an 
Hellenic state, which he will found, and the Hellenes are 
not to treat the barbarians as they treat one another, the 
Hellenic race being “alien and strange to the barbarians.” ὦ 
The vision of the Republic must, therefore, stand as an 
unconscious prophecy of the kingdom of Christ. The 
ancient heathen world could not supply the conditions de- 
manded for its fulfilment. 


Aristotle, when compared with Plato, his great teacher 
and friend, presents fewer points of similarity to Christian 
teaching, for the reason that his mind is less religious, and 
that he confines himself more closely to this mundane 
sphere, and to the phenomena that fall directly under hu- 
man observation. Aristotle was a Theist. He undertakes 
a scientific proof of the existence of a supreme intelligent 


1 Φημὶ γὰρ τὸ μὲν “Ελληνικὸν γένος αὐτὸ αὑτῷ οἰκεῖον εἷναι καὶ ξυγγε- 
νές, τῷ δὲ βαρβαρικῷ ὀθνειόν τε καὶ ἀλλότριον. Rep., v. 470 (Jowett, 11, 908). 


156 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Being, who must be presupposed as the first cause of mo- 
tion. God is,in His nature, pure energy, not a mere poten- 
tiality ; He is eternal, immaterial, unchangeable, incapable 
of motion; He is one being, a pure intelligence, leading a 
life of serene and blessed contemplation.’ His conception, 
though lofty, is defective from a Christian point of view, 
since God is brought into no constant, living relation to the 
world, as its Creator and Ruler, and, especially, no place is 
found for His moral government. 

Aristotle holds, likewise, to an immaterial, intelligent 
principle in man; but he leaves it doubtful whether this 
element of the soul is invested with individuality, and thus 
whether our personal life continues after death. Ethics, 
according to Aristotle, relates to human conduct, and does 
not concern itself with the end or rule of action which the 
gods adopt for themselves. He sets forth no general prin- 
ciple like that of Plato, that we are to imitate God as far 
as possible. And as the highest bond of unity is political, 
Ethics is treated as a subordinate branch of Politics. But 
within his own horizon, the perspicacity of this powerful 
thinker merits the admiration which has generally been 
bestowed upon it. He discerns and opposes the error of 
Socrates in confounding virtue with knowledge. He assigns 
to the voluntary faculty its proper place. If passion 
were caused by ignorance, he says, then ignorance ought to 
precede the passion, which is not the case—for example, 
when a man allows himself to be carried away by anger. 
Moreover, if sin were merely ignorance, there would be no 
ground for blame or punishment. As far as men are the 
authors of their character, they are responsible for the at- 
traction which, in consequence of that character, evil as- 
sumes. Our vices are voluntary, and are not the less 


1Aristotle, Metaphys., B. xii., where the whole doctrine of God is syste- 
matically unfolded. 


THE DOCTRINES OF ARISTOTLE. 157 


guilty, because they have become, through long indulgence 
and the power of habit, incurable. Luther attacked the 
doctrine of Aristotle that a virtuous principle is created by 
the doing of virtuous acts. The Reformer asserted that 
such acts presuppose a virtuous principle, and spring from 
it. It is true that Aristotle is acquainted with no trans- 
forming principle which may dictate conduct the reverse of 
what has existed hitherto; but, as Neander has pointed out, 
the doctrine of Aristotle as to the effect of moral action 
holds good when applied to the fortifying of a principle al- 
ready implanted. One must be good in order to do good ; 
but it is a case where the fountain is deepened by the outflow 
of its waters. 

Passing by the discussion of the particular virtues, where 
much is said in harmony with Christian morals, we advert 
to the interesting passage, in the Fourth Book of the 
Nicomachean Ethies, where Aristotle describes the man of 
magnanimity, or noble pride. This portraiture of the ideal 
man contains many features which deserve approval, from 
a Christian point of view. Yet when such a man is repre- 
sented as eager to do favors, but as ashamed to receive 
them, unwilling to stand in a relation of dependence on his 
fellow-men, and therefore scorning to be the recipient of 
benefits from them, we have a type of character at variance 
with the humility and fraternal fellowship which belong to 
- Christian excellence. The character which is depicted 
by Aristotle in this remarkable passage, is grand in its out- 
lines, but it lacks an essential element, the very leaven of 
Christian goodness, the spirit of love. 

It is evident that Aristotle does not rise above the intel- 
lectualism, which excludes the mass of mankind, on account 
of an alleged incapacity, from access to the highest good. 
In his treatise on Politics he makes slavery to be of two 
kinds, one of which springs from violence, and the law of 


158 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


war, and the other from the inferior mental powers of the 
enslaved.’ This last species of servitude he defends, on 
the ground that the enslaved are not fitted by nature for 
any higher lot. Some are born to command; others are 
fitted only to obey. To these last, servitude is a benefit. 
As reason in the individual is to the lower faculties, and 
as the soul is to the body, so is the enlightened class in 
society to those beneath them. The latter perform the part 
of animated implements, guided and managed by the su- 
perior intelligence of their owners. ? But in his Ethics, 
when he undertakes to explain the nature and foundation 
of friendship, he raises the question whether a man can 
have a slave for a friend, and betrays some perplexity in 
answering it. As being a mere animated tool, a slave can- 
not stand in the relatior of friend; but, as a man, he may ; 
and as such, may be the object of sincere attachment. * In 
this distinction, Aristotle shows a partial discernment of the 
incompatibility of slavery with the laws of nature, which, 
nevertheless, from the ancient point of view, he denied. ‘ 

At the close of his principal ethical treatise, Aristotle 
dilates with genuine eloquence on the lofty delight which 
belongs to intellectual contemplation, wherein man calls 
into exercise that part of his being in which he resembles 
the gods, and in this act must, therefore, be most pleasing 
to them. This is to live conformably to that which is 
highest in us, which is, to be sure, in bulk small, but in 
dignity and power is incomparably superior to all things 


1B. I. 3, seq. 

2 Kai 6 δοῦλος κτῆμά τι éupvyov.—Polit., i. 3. ὁ δὲ δοῦλος μέρος τι τοῦ 
Sear érov, οἷον ἔμψυχόν τι τοῦ σώματος κεχωρισμένον δὲ μέρος.---Τ 1}0., 1. 7. 

3 Ἢ, μὲν οὖν δοῦλος, οὐκ ἔστι φιλία πρὸς αὐτὸν, η δ᾽ ἄνϑρωπος" δοκεῖ yap 
εἷναί τι δίκαιον παντὶ ἀνϑρώπῳ πρὸς πάντα τὸν δυνάμενον κοινωνῆσαι νόμου 
καὶ συνθήκης" καὶ φιλίας δή, καθ᾽ ὅσον avOpwroc.—Eth. Nic., viii. 22. 

* With reference to occasional protests, in Antiquity, against slavery, 
see J. Barthelemy Saint Hilaire, Politique αὐ Aristote, i. 11. 3 3n. 


THE POST-ARISTOTELIAN SCHOOLS. 159 


besides. So doing, we, though mortal, put on, as far as 
may be, immortality. The exaltation of this kind of in- 
tellectual activity and joy above gratifications of an earthly 
sort is most impressively set forth. What Aristotle here 
describes, with so much depth of feeling, as the highest 
state of man, was necessarily conceived of, however, as the 
privilege of only a select few, while Christianity opens the 
door of access to the highest spiritual good, to all mankind. 
Nor does Aristotle connect this elevated form of activity, as 
it exists either in God or men, with a principle of benefi- 
cence which is a fountain of blessing, not to the subject 
alone, but to universal society. On the question whether 
personal consciousness survives death, the great question of 
the immortality of the soul, the writings of this Philosopher, 
as we have said, contain no clear and definite expression of 
opinion. 


From the time of Aristotle, the speculative tendency 
declined, and Philosophy assumed a’ practical cast.'! Its 
themes were virtue and happiness ; its problems related to 
human life on earth. The later schools, for the most part, 
borrowed their metaphysics from their predecessors. Re- 
ligious questions, such as the relation of Divine Providence 
to human agency, and to the existence of evil, became pro- 
minent. The individual was thrown back upon himself, 
and became an object of consideration, not as a member of 
the state, but as a man, a member of the human race. The 
causes of this great philosophical change were various. 
The fall of the Greek political communities, with the loss 
of freedom, the conquests of Alexander, and the intercourse 
of nations, East and West, with each other, the fusion of 
numerous peoples in the Roman Empire, were events which 
compelled this intellectual revolution. The old political 
organizations, in which the life of the individual centred, 

1 See Zeller, Phil. d. Griechen, iii. 1 seq. 


160 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


were broken up. He was driven, almost, to look upon 
himself in a broader relation, as a citizen of the world. 
Moreover, the impulse which Socrates gave to ethical in- 
quiry, although it was combined in him with a specu- 
lative element, and still more in Plato and Aristotle, con- 
tinued to be potent, and became prevailing. The Stoic 
and Epicurean systems, antagonistic to each other as they 
appear to be, and as, in their particular features, they really 
are, manifest the same subjective character. Tranquillity 
and serenity of the inner life is the end and aim of both. 
Skepticism was the natural sequence of the stagnation of 
philosophical speculation, after the productive period was 
over, and of the mutual conflict of the various systems. 
Skepticism passed, by a natural transition, into eclecticism, 
which selected from each of the rival systems whatever 
might accord with individual predilection. Finally, the 
New Platonism was a form of mysticism affording refuge to 
the believing but perplexed inquirer. 

The two systems which, on account of their influence, 
we have occasion here to consider, are the Epicurean and 
the Stoic. We begin with the former. 

The theology of Epicurus was a scheme of practical 
atheism. The adherents of this school did not deny the 
existence of the gods, but they denied to them any interest, 
or concern, in the affairs of the world. The current ideas 
of this philosophy are embodied, with wonderful skill and 
beauty, in the poem of Lucretius, which has for its subject 
the Nature of Things. Regarding superstition as the great 
bane of mankind, he sets out to disabuse the mind of the 
beliefs that give rise to it. He adopts the atomic theory 
of Democritus, in accounting for the origin of the world :— 


“For never, doubtless, from result of thought, 
Or natural compact, could primordial seeds 
First harmonize, or move with powers precise ; 


THE EPICUREAN SYSTEM. 161 


But ever changing, ever changed and vext 

From earliest time, through ever-during space, 
From ceaseless repercussion every mode 

Of motion, magnitude and shape essayed ; 

At length the unwieldy mass the form assumed 
Of things created.” ! 


The same power that began these movements carries 
them forward. The heavens and the earth, as they had a 
beginning, approach the epoch of decay and dissolution. 
The soul is material, and mortal; hence the dread of any- 
thing hereafter is needless and vain. All fear of the gods, 
with which men torment themselves, is irrational, since the 
gods stand aloof from men, and are absorbed in their own 
enjoyments. Such is the gloomy creed of the great Poet 
of the Epicurean sect. The end and aim of existence, 
according to this school, is pleasure. Socrates had held 
that man is made for virtue and for happiness, without de- 
fining accurately the relation of these two ends of our 
being. Plato, though not with entire consistency, gives 
the precedence to virtue, and teaches the doctrine of in- 
tuitive morals. Aristotle holds that happiness is the chief 
good, but distinguishes between higher and lower kinds of 
happiness. To ascertain what happiness man is made for, 
we must ascertain the function—the ἔργον---οὐ a being en- 
dowed with reason. Virtue is the action which produces 
the highest happiness, the happiness proper to man; but 


1“Nam certe neque consilio primordia rerum 
Ordine se suo queeque sagaci mente locarunt 
Nec quos queeque sageei mente locarunt 
Nec quos queque darent motus pepigere profecto, 
Sed quia multis modis multis mutata per omne 
Ex infinito vexantur percitur plagis, 
Omne genus motus et coetus experiundo 
Tandem devenerunt in talis disposituras, 
Qualibus hc rerum consistit summa creata, ete. 
Β, i. 1021-1028. 
11 


162 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


then the highest happiness is defined as that which 
springs from virtue; nor does the Stagyrite extricate him- 
self from this circle. The Epicureans resolved all good 
into pleasure. All special desires are to be subordinate to 
the general desire of happiness; and in this notion of 
happiness, the approbation of conscience is not included. 
Virtue, therefore, is a self-regarding prudence which so 
regulates the various propensities and cravings of human 
nature as to derive the highest pleasure in the aggregate. 
Tt is the control of a far-sighted expediency by which 
unruly instincts are kept in subjection. The founders of 
this school led virtuous lives, but the doctrine contained 
no motives of sufficient power to restrain the passions of 
men generally, and, in the progress of time, showed its real 
tendencies. 

Stoicism existed in two forms ; first, the original system 
of Zeno and Chrysippus, and, secondly, the modified Roman 
Stoicism of the first and second centuries of the Christian 
era. If we looked at the metaphysics of Stoicism, we 
should infer that this philosophy contained little or nothing 
in harmony with Christianity. It was a revival of the 
Heraclitic, or Hylozoist, Pantheism. Nothing exists but 
matter. The soul itself is a corporeal entity. The universe 
is one, and is governed by one, all-ruling law. Matter and 
the Deity are identical—the same principle in different 
aspects. The Deity, that is to say, is the immanent, crea- 
tive force in matter, which acts ever according to law. This 
principle, developed in the totality of things, is Zeus. It 
is Providence, or Destiny. The universal force works 
blindly, but after the analogy of a rational agency. The 
world, proceeding by evolution from the primitive fire, 
eventually returns to its source through a universal con- 
flagration, and the same process is to be renewed in an 
endless series of cycles. Fate rules all. The world is ap 


THE STOIC CONCEPTION OF VIRTUE. 163 


organic unity ; considered as a whole, it is perfect. Evil, 
when looked at in relation to the entire system, is good. 
The denial of free agency, and of immortality, was a corol- 
lary. As to the personality of the minor gods, the old 
Stoics were vacillating. Now they are spoken of as func- 
tions of nature, and now as persons. But if personal, they 
share the fate of men; they disappear in the final confla- 
gration. 

It seems strange that any system of morals worthy of 
the name could co-exist with these ideas. The truth is, 
however, that the Stoics did not derive their Ethics from 
their physical and metaphysical theories, but borrowed these 
last from the pre-Socratic schools, without setting them in 
a vital connection with their ethical doctrine.  Self- 
preservation, to be distinguished from the desire of happi- 
ness, they hold to be the original, fundamental impulse of 
all beings. The essential thing is to live according to na- 
ture. This is the great maxim of the Stoic Ethics.’ By 
“nature” is meant the universal system in which the indi- 
vidual is one link ; sometimes, however, the constitution of 
the individual is denoted ; and sometimes the term is used 
in a more restricted way still, to denote the rational faculty 
by itself. But to live according to nature is the one su- 
preme, comprehensive duty. Virtue springs from rational 
self-determination, where reason alone guides the will, and 
the influence of the affections and emotions is smothered. 
These are contrary to reason; they interfere with the free- 
dom of the’soul. No anger, no pity, no lenity, no indul- 
gence—this was the pure creed of Stoicism. Apathy is the 
right condition of the soul, which should be moved only 
by reason. Knowledge is necessary to virtue, since right 

1 τέλος ἐστὶ τὸ ὁμολογουμένως τῇ φύσει ζῆν. Teaching of Cleanthes, 


ap. Stob., Eel. ii., p. 192 (Ritter and Preller, p. 380, where are the paral- 
lel statements of Chrysippus). 


164 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


doing without rational insight does not fill out the concep- 
tion of virtue. Hence the virtuous man is the sage, the 
wise man; every other isa fool. Virtue, too, if it exist 
at all, must exist as a whole. It is asingle principle ; and 
so, too, the vices are united. Hence the world is divided 
into two classes, the virtuous or wise, and the wicked or 
foolish. 

This stern ideal of primitive Stoicism was softened by the 
doctrine of preferables. Virtue is the sole thing which is 
good in itself. But there are external things which are 
auxiliary to virtue, and these may be called good, in a 
secondary sense; and so external things which are un- 
favorable to virtue, may be termed evil. There is, also, 
a third class of neutral things, not being either advantage- 
ous or hurtful in this relation. Thus the Stoics discussed 
the question whether fame is a preferable. Chrysippus de- 
cided in the negative, and so did Marcus Aurelius in one 
of the most interesting passages of his “ Meditations.” ? A 
class of conditional duties, or middle duties, resulted from 
the doctrine of preferables. Then the doctrine as to the 
affections was softened. Their first beginnings were al- 
lowed ; and certain emotions were admitted to be desira- 
ble. So, different grades, or stages in the attainment of 
virtue, were conceded to exist. 

Stoicism was cosmopolitan. It brought in the idea of a 
citizenship of the world. There is one community, one 
state, one set of laws. To this one state, all particular 
states are related, as are the houses in a city to one another. 
The sage labors that all may recognize themselves as one 
flock, and dwell together under the common rule of rea- 
son. “ My nature,” says Marcus Aurelius, “is rational 
and social ; and my city and country, so far as I am An- 
toninus, is Rome; but so far as I am a man, it is the 


1 vi. 16, 18 (Long’s Translation, pp. 166, 167). 


THE ROMAN STOICISM. 165 


world.” ! A Stoic, writes Epictetus, “when beaten must 
love those who beat him, as the father, as the brother, of 
411. 2. One must give himself up with perfect resignation 
to the course of the world. There is a rationality and wis- 
dom in it; hence the duty of perfect, uncomplaining sub- 
mission to things as they occur. All things are divided 
into two classes, the things that are within our power, and 
the things that are beyond our power. With regard to 
everything that falls under the latter category, “ Be pre- 
pared,” says Epictetus, “to say that it is nothing to you.” ὅ 
“You must accuse neither God nor man. You must 
altogether control desire; and you must transfer aversion 
to such things only as are controllable by will.” * “That,” 
says M. Aurelius, “is for the good of each thing, which 
the universal nature brings to each. And it is for its good 
at the time when nature brings 10. “TI say then to the 
universe, that I love as thou lovest.” ® 

The Roman Stoicism departed in certain particulars 
from the rigid system of the founders of the sect. There 
is a recognition, though not distinct and uniform, of the 
personality of God, of the reality of the soul as distinct 
from the body, and of the continuance of personal life after 
death. In Seneca, the Stoic philosophy appears in a very 
mitigated form. Self-sufficiency gives way to a sense of 
weakness and imperfection, which is not far removed from 

"ἡ δὲ ἐμὴ φύσις λογικὴ καὶ πολιτική. πόλις καὶ πατρὶς, ὡς μὲν Αντωνίνῳ, 
μοι ἡ Ῥώμη, ὡς δὲ ἀνθρώπῳ, ὁ κόσμος. Meditations, vi. 44 (Long, p. 178). 

2_kal δαιρόμενον φιλεῖν αὐτοὺς δαίροντας ὡς πατέρα πάντων, ὡς ἀδελφόν, 
Discourses, III. xxii. 54 (Carter’s translation, Boston Ed., 1866, p. 250). 

ὅ-πρόχειρον ἔστω τὸ διότι οὐδὲν πρὸς ἐμέ. Encheirid. i. (Carter, p- 570). 

4 οὐ θεῷ ἐγκαλοῦντα, οὐκ ἀνθρώπῳ: ὄρεξιν ἁραί σε δεῖ παντελῶς, ἔκκλισιν 
ἐπὶ μόνα μεταθεῖναι τὰ προαιρετικά, Discourses, III. xxii. 13 (Carter, p. 
244). 

ὃ Συμφέρει ἑκάστῳ, ὃ φέρει ἑκάστῳ ἡ τῶν ὅλων φύσις. Kal τότε συμφέρε:, 
ὅτε ἐκείνη φέρει. Meditt. x. 20 (Long, p. 259). 

6 Λέγω οὖν τῷ κέσμῳ ὅτι σοι ovvep@, Meditt. x, 21 (Long, p. 259). 


166 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Christian feeling. He declares that there is no pos- 
sibility of a sinless character among men; we are to 
follow the gods as far as human infirmity will allow. 
He paints the struggle of the soul, aspiring heaven- 
ward, with the flesh which clogs and enchains it. ἢ 
There is a paragraph in his treatise on Clemency, in which 
he describes the sinfulness of mankind in language which 
reminds one of the Apostle Paul. He calls upon us to 
imagine a populous, crowded city, through the streets of 
which the multitudes are hurrying. What a solitude and 
desolation would be there, if none were left except those 
whom a strict judge could acquit of guilt! The judge and 
the accuser themselves are involved in condemnation. 
We have all sinned. Not only so, but we shall sin to the 
end of life. Like Plato, he ascribes the creation to the 
goodness of God. ‘The first essential of worship is to be- 
lieve in the gods, and to imitate their excellence. Men are 
the children of God. The sufferings of good men are 
the fatherly chastisement inflicted by Him. It is good for 
men to be afflicted ; those who have not experienced ad- 
versity are objects of pity. A divine spirit dwells within 
the soul as a watchman and protector. From God nothing 
can be concealed. Seneca says that when he retires to his 
bed at night, he reviews his words and conduct for the en- 
tire day. Meditation and self-examination are inculcated 
1Qmne illi cum hac carne gravi certamen est, ne abstrahatur et sidat ; 
nititur illo unde dimissus est: ibi illum eterna requies manet, e con- 
fusis crassisque pura et liquida visentem. (ad Marc., xxiv.) 
2Peccavimus omnes: alii gravia, alii leviora, alii ex destinato, alii 
forte impulsi, aut aliena nequitia ablati; alii in bonis consiliis parum 
fortiter stetimus, et innocentiam inviti ac renitentes perdidimus. Nec 
delinquimus tantum, sed usque ad extremum eyi delinquemus. Ο. vi. 
846 Prov. I. Quoniam quidem bonus ipse tempore tantum a Deo dif- 
fert, discipulus ejus, emulatorque, et vera progenies. Cf. de Benef. il 


29: Cogita quanta nobis tribuerit parens noster. 
4de Ira., iii. 36. ‘“ Nihil mihi ipse abscondo, nihil transeo.” 


THE TEACHINGS OF SENECA. 167 


with all the urgency of a Christian preacher. It is well 
for each one to have a faithful confidant and counsellor to 
whom he can unburden the secrets of his heart. “ Pray 
and live,” he says, “as if the eye of God were upon you.” ! 
“ Live every day as if it were the last.” ? 

The obligation to cherish just and human feelings is fre- 
quently asserted by Seneca. ‘ You must live for another,” 
he says, “if you would live for yourself.” 8 “ Nature,” 
he says, “ bids me assist men; and whether they be slaves 
or free, whether of gentle blood or freedmen, whether they 
enjoy liberty as a right or a friendly gift, what matter ? 
Wherever a man is, there is room for doing good.”4 He 
condemns gladiatorial shows.’ He says: “live with an 
inferior, as you would have a superior live with you.” ὃ 
He declares that “slaves are our fellow-servants,” and are 
to be kindly treated.’ 

The coincidences between the moral teaching of Seneca 
and that of the New Testament are numerous and striking.* 
That only a pure mind can comprehend God; that in the 
intent of the heart guilt lies; that a wise man, when he is 
buffeted, will imitate Cato, who, when he was smitten on 
the mouth, refused to avenge himself; that we should be 


1 Sic vive cum hominibus, tanquam Deus videat. Ep. x. 

Sic ordinandus est dies omnis, tanquam cogat agmen, et consumet 
atque expleat vitam. Ep. xii. 

3 Ep. xlviii. Alteri vivas oportet, si vis tibi vivere. 

4de Vita beata, 24. Hominibus prodesse natura jubet: servi liberine 
sint, ingenui an libertini, juste libertatis, an inter amicos date, quid 
refert ? ubicumque homo est, ibi beneficio locus est. 

5 Kpist., vil. 

®Sic cum inferiore vivas, quemadmodum tecum superiorem vyelles 
vivere. Ep. xlvii. 

™Servi sunt? immo conservi, si cogitaveris tantumdem in utrosque 
licere fortune. Epist., xlvii. 

8 See Dr. Lightfoot’s Essay, Philippians, p. 281 seq., where the refer- 
ences are given, and the parallel references to the New Testament. 


168 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


gentle to enemies; that we should follow the example of 
the gods who “soften the ground with showers,” and do 
good without the hope of reward; that we should avoid 
the manners and dress of an ascetic, and do nothing to at- 
tract praise; that we should seek after true riches, and in- 
vest our good deeds as a treasure buried in the ground ; 
that we should not mark the pimples of others when we 
are covered with countless ulcers; that we should expect 
from others what we have done to others; that we should 
give as we should wish to receive; that good does not grow 
out of evil, more than a fig from an olive-tree; that hypo- 
crites are miserable and filthy within, though adorned 
without, like their own walls; that words must be sown 
like seed, which, though small at first, unfolds its strength 
and spreads into the largest growth; that it is madness to 
embark on distant hopes, and to say: “I will buy,” “1 
will build,” “TI will lend out,” “ I will demand payment,” 
“1 will bear honors;” that the gods are not honored by 
fat victims, but by the pious and upright intent of the 
worshipper; that love cannot be mingled with fear; that 
our life is a pilgrimage in a strange land, and our bodies 
tabernacles of the soul; that good men toil, they spend and 
are spent; that the evil man turns all things to evil; that 
to obey God is liberty; that the whole world is the temple 
of the immortal gods; that God must be consecrated in 
the heart of each man; that God is near thee, with thee, 
within thee; that He should not be framed out of silver 
and gold,—these are among the sayings of the Roman 
Philosopher which recall parallel statements in the New 
Testament. 

The personal character of Seneca fell short of his own 
exalted standard of independence and excellence. But in 
Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius, the noblest principles were 
exemplified as well as taught. The former excels all other 


STOICISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 169 


Stoic writers in the terseness and vigor of his utterances, 
which often startle the reader from their resemblance to 
New Testament teaching. The meditations of Marcus 
Aurelius likewise abound in passages which a Christian 
believer can read with earnest sympathy. In these writers, 
Stoicism, while it retains its fundamental ideas, has lost 
much of its austerity, and breathes a gentler spirit. 

The resemblance between certain sentiments in the later 
Stoics, and passages in the New Testament, has given rise 
to the suggestion of an influence from one side to the other. 
The accordance, as regards phraseology as well as thought, 
is most striking in the case of Seneca. A fictitious corres- 
pondence, consisting of fourteen letters, between Paul and 
the Roman Philosopher, was composed, probably in the 
fourth century, either for the purpose of recommending 
Seneca to the esteem of Christians, or of exciting them to a 
study of his writings. By some, Seneca is thought to have 
been acquainted with Paul, and to have derived from him, 
and from other New Testament authors, sentiments and 
expressions of the kind already quoted. But the earlier 
writings of Seneca must have antedated the circulation of 
the Gospels in Rome, and the Epistle to the Hebrews, to 
which the passage respecting the chastisement of God’s 
children bears the closest resemblance. ! Some of the sen- 
tences which remind us of Christian teaching are drawn 
by the Roman Stoic from Plato, and other earlier writers. 
Morover, these choice doctrines, which we have cited, stand 
in connection with principles at variance with Christian 
truth, which prove incontestably that Seneca was not a 
Christian disciple. The phrases which are parallel in form 
to statements in the New Testament, often have in Seneca 
an entirely different setting. They rest upon metaphysical 
and theological dogmas widely diverse from the doctrines 


1See Lightfoot, p. 289. 


170 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


of Christianity. We may reasonably assume a familiarity 
on the part of Paul with Stoic ideas and phrases, since 
Tarsus was a prominent seat of Stoic teaching. The quo- 
tation in Acts xvii. 28, is from the hymn of Cleanthes, and 
from the Stoic-Poet, Aratus, who was connected with Tarsus. 
The Stoic description of the Sage,the Apostle applied in a 
higher and truer sense to the Christian believer. In the 
believer alone were true liberty, kingship, and the other 
lofty attributes imputed to the Sage, realized. The ethical 
terms and conceptions of Stoicism were widely diffused. 
While it is not impossible, therefore, that Seneca, it may be 
through intercourse with Christian slaves, had gained some 
knowledge of the moral teaching of the Gospel, we are not 
justified in affirming with any confidence that this was the 
case. | 

It is worthy of note that there are so few allusions to 
Christians in the heathen writers of the first and second 
centuries. There is no mention of them whatever in Plu- 
tarch, but one reference to them in Epictetus, and but one 
in Marcus Aurelius. It is thought by some scholars, how- 
ever, that Stoicism was affected indirectly by Christian 
teaching, and caught up from the atmosphere induced by 
the Gospel, peculiarities most accordant with Christian 
feeling. It is undeniable that, from the second century 
onward, there was an amelioration of sentiment, and a cor- 
responding softening of the rigor of laws, on the heathen 
side. Thus, the laws bearing on domestic relations, on the 


1 The necessity of supposing an acquaintance with Christianity on the 
part of Seneca, as the solution of the peculiarities in his teaching to which 
we have referred, is opposed by Baur in his able essay, Seneca τι. Paulus, 
in Hilgenfeld’s Zeitschr. f. wissenschaftl. Theol. i. 1848, and by Denis, 
Hist. des Théories et Idées morales dans  Antig. The opposite opinion is 
advocated by Schmidt, Mssai Hist. sur la Soc. Civile dans le Monde Romain 
ete, p. 378, and by Troplong, De I’ Influence du Christianisme sur le Drowt 
Civil des Romains, p. 77. 


STOICISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 171 


prerogatives of husbands, fathers, and masters, became more 
nearly conformed to Christian ideas. There was, more- 
over, a general progress of humane feeling. Epictetus con- 
demns slavery as growing out of a higher regard for ‘the 
unjust laws of men long dead ” than for “ the divine laws.”? 
Nerva, Trajan, and other Emperors, and subordinate ma- 
gistrates in cities, provided funds for the sustenance of poor 
children. Unquestionably, Stoicism had an influence in 
producing this improved tone of feeling, which is seen in 
Jaws and social customs. A learned French writer ob- 
serves: “The Jurists who flourished after Cicero were in 
general inspired by Stoicism, which gave them severe and 
precise rules for the conduct of men to each other. The 
whole moral and philosophical part of Roman Law, from 
Labeon that Stoic innovator, to Caius and Ulpian, is drawn 
from this school, the partiality to which grows from day to 
day among the choice men who shine forth here and there 
in the imperial period.” Mr. Maine has remarks of a like 
tenor.’ The question is, how far this widening of sympa- 
thy, which we see in Stoicism, sprang from the indirect 
effect of Gospel teaching upon the general currents of 
thought outside of the pale of the Church. That a 
party may be thus affected by its antagonists is a fami- 
liar experience. For example, none will deny that 
the English Church was materially influenced by the 
Methodist movement which it so generally opposed. 
Without denying that an influence of the character de- 
scribed may have reached, to some extent, cultivated men 
in the Roman Empire, who knew little directly of the 
Gospel, or knew it only to oppose it, we must guard 
against attributing too much to such a modifying agency, 
It is an evident fact that the tendency of political events 
and of philosophic thought—we might say, of the whole 


BE Dinay ἃς 19: ? Troplong, p. 53. 3 Ancient Law, ch. iii. 


173 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


course of history, had been to engender a more cosmopoli- 
tan view, a more catholic sympathy. The early masters 
of Greek Philosophy, and none more decidedly than Aris- 
totle, had inculcated the obligation of mutual love among 
citizens of the same community. With the fall of these 
communities, there came in the Stoic conception of the uni- 
versal city, coterminous with mankind. As the privileges 
that belonged to Rome were more and more imparted to 
the nations subject to her, Rome was conceived of by many 
as a realization of the universal city, as the common country 
of the race. We find these conceptions in Roman writers 
from the time of Cicero; and along with this general notion 
of a universal state, we find, in theory at least, a wider 
spirit of humanity. It is not from any Christian influence 
that Lucan, who died, A. p. 65, calls upon mankind to 
lay down the weapons of war and to love one another,’ 
and that Plutarch affirms that man has his country in 
whatever part of the earth he may find himself. ὅ 

The letters of the younger Pliny afford fine illustrations 
of this more benevolent and refined tone of sentiment. ὃ 
We can account, then, for the elevated, philanthropic ex- 
pressions of men like Seneca, and for the broader spirit of 
the Stoic lawyers, by a providential development within 
the limits of heathenism itself. 

When we bring the Stoical Philosophy into comparison 
with Christianity, we discern some marked characteristics 
of a general nature which they have in common. First, 
Stoicism was an eminently practical system. It sought to 


1Tunc genus humanum positis sibi consulat armis, 
Inque vicem gens omnis amet. Phars. 1. 60. 
2 de Exil. 
3 See, for example, his Letter on the death of his slaves, to Paternus 
(viii. 16), or his Letter occasioned by the death of the daughter of Fun- 
danus (vy. 16). 


STOICISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 178 


determine how men should live, and how they could be 
prepared to bear trouble, and to die, with composure. 
Secondly, like Christianity, it exalted inward, or spiritual 
excellence. All outward things are counted as nothing. 
The Stoic held power, fame, wealth, even health and life, 
as possessions to be resigned without a murmur. Inde- 
pendence, inward freedom, was deemed the pearl of great 
price! And thirdly, there are special injunctions, in 
which the Stoic teachers approach near to the precepts of 
the Christian religion. 

The differences between Stoicism and the Gospel are 
equally apparent :— 

1. Stoicism makes virtue the ethical end. But Chris- 
tianity, while giving the first place to holiness, is not indif- 
ferent to happiness. Love, the essential principle in Chris- 
tian morals, is itself a source of joy, and seeks the happi- 
ness of its object. The Cynics were the precursors of the 
Stoics, and the leaven of Cynicism was never wholly ex- 
pelled from the Stoic teaching. We find when we scruti- 
nize the Stoical idea of virtue that it is practically self- 
regarding. It is not the good of others, but a subjective 
serenity, which is really sought for. There is a more 
benevolent feeling in the later type of Stoicism, but this 
involves a partial desertion of the characteristics of the 
school. 

2. The Stoic definition of virtue is formal, not material. 
It gives a certain relation of virtue, but not its contents. 
What that life is which is conformed to nature, and swayed 
by reason, is not contained in the definition. 

3. Weare furnished with no concrete or exact concep- 
tion of “nature.” “ Live according to nature,” we are told; 
but no criterion is afforded for distinguishing between the 
original nature of man, and the corruption resulting from 


1 See the noble chapter of Epictetus, on Freedom, Diss. iv. 1, 


174. THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


human perversity and sin. It is remarkable that Seneca 
acknowledges the need of a moral ideal, a pattern by which 
we can shape our conduct. He advises us to revolve the 
examples of good men and heroes, like Cato, in order to 
draw from them guidance ; though he admits their imper- 
fection, and consequent insufficiency for this end. Chris- 
tianity, alone, supplies this need, by presenting human 
nature in its purity and perfection, in the person of Christ. 


4. Stoicism supposes a possible incompatibility between 
the welfare of the individual and the course of the world. 
It implies a discordance in nature, which is in violation of 
a primary assumption that the system is harmonious. For 
the Stoics justified suicide. Zeno and Cleanthes destroyed 
their own lives. Seneca praises Cato for killing himself. 
“Tf the house smokes, go out of it,” ὁ is the laconic mode 
of advising suicide in case one finds his condition unbear- 
able,—a phrase which we find in Epictetus and Marcus 
Aurelius. There might be situations, it was held, when it 
is undignified or dishonorable to continue to live. Poverty, 
chronic illness, or incipient weakness of mind, were deemed 
a sufficient reason for terminating one’s life. It was the 
means of baffling a tyrant, which nature had given to the 
weak ; as Cassius is made to say : 


— Life, being weary of these worldly bars, 
Never lacks power to dismiss itself.” ? 


Seneca says that a man may choose the mode of his death, 
as one chooses a ship for a journey, or a house to live in. 
Life and death are among the adiaphora—things indifferent, 
which may be chosen or rejected according to circumstances. 


1 Καπνὸν πεποίηκεν ἐν τῷ οἰκήματι; ἂν μέτριον, μενῶ" av λίαν πολὺν͵ 
é&¢pyouat.—Epict., Discourses, I. xxv. 18 (Carter, p. 72). The same 
simile is frequently used. Compare Seneca, Epp. xvii., xxiv., xxvi. 

2 Shakespeare, Jul. Cesar, Act i. Se. Te 


STOICISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 118 


How contrary is all this to the Christian feeling! The 
Christian believes in a Providence which makes all things 
work together for his good, and believes that there are no 
circumstances in which he is authorized to lay violent hands 
upon himself. There is no situation in which he cannot 
live with honor, and with advantage to himself as long as 
God chooses to continue him in being. Hence, in the 
Scriptures there is no express prohibition of suicide, and no 
need of one. 

5. Stoicism exhibits no rational ground for the passive 
virtues, which are so prominent in the Stoic morals. There 
is no rational end of the cosmos; no grand and worthy 
consummation towards which the course of the world is 
tending. Evil is not overruled to subserve a higher good 
to emerge at the last. There is no inspiring future on 
which the eye of the sufferer can be fixed. The goal that 
bounds his vision is the conflagration of all things. Hence 
there is no basis for reconciliation to sorrow and evil. 
Christianity, in the doctrine of the kingdom of God, fur- 
nishes the element which Stoicism lacked, and provides 
thus a ground for resignation under all the ills of life, and 
amid the confusion and wickedness of the world. For the 
same reason, the character of Christian resignation is 
different from the Stoic composure. It is submission to a 
wise and merciful Father, who sees the end from the be- 
ginning. Hence, there is no repression of natural emotions, 
as of grief in case of bereavement; but these are tempered, 
and prevented from overmastering the spirit, by trust in 
the Heavenly Father. In the room of an impassible 
serenity, an apathy secured by stifling natural sensibility, 
there is the peace which flows from filial confidence. 

6. Much less does Stoicism afford a logical foundation 
for the active virtues. The doctrine of fatalism, if con- 
sistently carried out, paralyzes exertion. And how is the 


176 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


motive for aggressive virtue weakened, when the ultimate 
result of all effort is annihilation—the destruction of per- 
sonal life, and the return of the universe to chaos! 

7. The cosmopolitan quality of Stoicism was negative. 
Zeno’s idea of a universal community, transcending the 
barriers imposed by separate nationalities, shows that the 
ancient order of things failed to satisfy the spirit, aspiring 
after a wider communion. Seneca says: “ We are mem- 
bers of a vast body. Nature made us kin, when she pro- 
duced us from the same things, and to the same ends.” 
“The world is my country, and the gods its rulers.” There 
is a vast commonwealth, in which are comprised gods and 
men, and which is coextensive with the world. “ Virtue,” 
he says, “is barred to none: she is open to all, she receives 
all, she invites all, gentlefolk, freedmen, slaves, kings, 
exiles alike.”! Sentences like these indicate that the limita- 
tions essential to ancient thought, which knew no fellowship 
broader than that of the state, were broken through. But 
such a community as Zeno and Seneca dreamed of, did not 
and could not arise, until the kingdom of Christ was estab- 
lished on earth. Then these obscure aspirations, and grand 
but impossible visions, became a reality. 

8. The predominant motive which the Stoic moralists 
present for the exercise of forbearance and the kindred vir- 
tues, is not love, but rather fealty to an ideal of character, 
the theory that sin is from ignorance, and is involuntary, 
which turns resentment into pity, and the consideration 
that everything is fated, and, in its place, useful. The 
offender is often regarded with a feeling akin to disdain. 
The ten reasons which M. Aurelius addresses to himself as 
motives to forbearance are, that it is nature that orders all 
things; that men are under compulsion in respect of 
opinions; that men do wrong involuntarily, and in igno- 


1 De Benef. iii. 18. 


STOICISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 177 


rance; that thou, also—addressing himself—doest many 
things wrong, and art disposed to other faults, but art 
withheld from timidity or some other unworthy motive; 
that one must know much in order to pass a correct judg- 
ment on another; that, when vexed, one should remember 
that ‘man’s life is only for a moment, and after a short 
time we are all laid out dead;”’ that no wrongful act of 
another brings shame on thee; that anger and vexation 
give more pain than the actions that provoke them; 
that benevolence is invincible, and that evil is overcome by 
patience and kindness ; and that to expect bad men not to 
do wrong is madness. Among these considerations are 
some on which the New Testament also insists. The sweep- 
ing remark, which is sometimes heard from the pulpit, that 
the duty of forgiving injuries was not known to the hea- 
then moralists, is not true. The younger Pliny recom- 
mends forbearance and forgiveness. Plutarch, in his book 
on the delay of Providence in punishing the wicked, assigns 
among the reasons for this course, the desire on the part of 
God to give room for repentance, and to furnish an example 
of a forbearing and placable disposition. Clemency is an im- 
pulse of human nature as truly as resentment. Christianity 
introduced no new element into the constitution of the soul. 
It gave new motives for the exercise of forbearance, and, by 
its power to conquer selfishness, imparted to the benevolent 
sentiments a control which had not belonged to them be- 
fore. It is evident that the false metaphysics of the Stvic 
school played an important part in producing the temper 
of forbearance which they inculcated. Sin is ignorance, sin 
is fated, sin is for the best, anger disturbs the peace of the 
soul,—these are prominent among the motives for the exer- 
cise of forbearance. “Ifa right choice,” says Epictetus, 


1 _axapaioc ὁ ἀνθρώπειος βίος, καὶ μετ᾽ ὀλίγον πάντες ἐξετάθημεν. ---Ἰ,. xi. 


18 (Long, p. 281). 
12 


178 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


“be the only good, and a wrong one the only evil, what 
further room is there for quarreling, for reviling? About 
what can it be? About what is nothing to us. Against 
whom? Against the ignorant, against the unhappy, against 
those who are deceived in the most important respects.” ἢ 


9. The self-sufficiency of Stoicism stands in direct oppo- 
sition to Christian humility. The independence of the 
individual, the power to stand alone as regards men and 
the gods, is the acme of Stoical attainment. The Stoic felt 
himself on the level of Zeus, both being subject to fate; and 
he aimed to find the sources of strength and peace within 
himself. Christianity, on the contrary, finds the highest 
good in the complete fellowship of man, sensible of his 
absolute dependence, with God. The starting-point is 
humility, a feeling the very reverse of Stoical pride and 
self-dependence. It is a noteworthy but not inexplicable 
fact, that while many from the Platonic school, in the first 
centuries, became Christian disciples, very few Stoics em- 
braced the Gospel. Notwithstanding the many points of 
resemblance and affinity, there was a radical antagonism 
between the two systems. 


The Greek Philosophy reached the limit of its develop- 
ment in New Platonism, as taught in the first centuries of 
the Christian era by Plotinus, and his successors, Porphyry 
and Jamblichus, and by Proclus, the last eminent representa- 
tive of this school. ? Skepticism, the consequence of the 
bewildering conflict of philosophical theories, left no 
resting-place for minds of a religious turn. Their natural 


1 Ei δ᾽ ola δεῖ προαίρεσις, τοῦτο μόνον ἀγαθόν ἔστι. καὶ οἷα py dei, τοῦτο 
μόνον κακόν" ποῦ ἔτι μάχη; ποῦ λοιδορία; περὶ τίνων ; περὶ τῶν οὐδὲν πρὸς 
ἡμᾶς" πρὸς τίνας ; πρὸς τοὺς ἀγνοοῦντας, πρὸς τοὺς δυστυχοῦντας, πρὸς τοὺς 
ἠπατημένους περὶ τῶν μεγίστων. Discourses, TV., v. 32. (Carter, p. 832). 

3 Plotinus was born A. D, 204, and died A. D. 269, 


NEW PLATONISM. 179 


refuge was in mysticism, where feeling and intuition super- 
sede the slow and doubtful processes of the intellect. Plotinus 
found in Platonism the starting-point and principal 
materials for his speculations; although the reconciliation 
of philosophies, and especially of the two masters, Plato and 
Aristotle, was a prominent part of his effort. 


With Plotinus, the absolute Being, the antecedent of 
all that exists, is impersonal, the ineffible unity, exalted 
above all vicissitude and change. The idea of a creative 
activity on the part of God is thus excluded. Emanation, 
after a Pantheistic conception, would seem to be the method 
by which the universe originates from the primary being ; 
yet this notion is discarded, since it would imply division 
in this being, and the imparting of a portion of its contents. 
Matter is evil, and the original fountain of evil. The hu- 
man soul finds its purification only in separating itself from 
the material part with which here it stands in connection. 
The highest attainment and perfect blessedness lie in the 
ecstatic condition, in which the soul rises to the intuition 
and embrace of the Supreme Entity, sinking for the time 
its own individuality in this rapturous union with the 
Infinite 

While the Platonic idea of resemblance to God, as the 
life and soul of virtue, is held in form, its practical value 
is lost by this sacrifice of personality in the object towards 
which we are to aspire. The civil virtues '—wisdom, cou- 
rage, temperance and justice—are retained; but higher 
than these are placed the purifying or cathartic virtues, by 
which the soul emancipates itself from subjection to sense ; 
while the highest achievement is the elevation to God, 
where the consciousness of personal identity is drowned in 
the beatific contemplation of the Supreme. 


§ πολιτικαὶ ἀρεταί, 


180 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


This kind of rapture is possible only to elect spirits, who 
are qualified by superior endowments for so lofty an ascent. 
The supercilious tone of the ancient philosophy, the notion 
of an oligarchy of philosophers, to whom the common herd 
are subservient, is thus maintained to the full in this final 
phase of Greek thought. “The life of worthy men,” says 
Plotinus, ‘“‘ tends to the summit and that which is on high.” 
The life which is merely human is two-fold, “the one 
being mindful of virtue and partaking of a certain guod ; 
but the other pertaining to the vile rabble, and to artificers 
who minister to the necessities of more worthy men.”? 
Asceticism was the natural offspring of a system in which 
all that is corporeal is evil. Superstition, especially in the 
form of magic and sorcery, was likewise conspicuous in 
Jamblichus, and in the other later devotees of this school. 

Christianity holds to ἃ possible illumination of the 
human mind, and to a blessed communidn with God. 
But this is not a boon open only to a few who are raised 
intellectually above the rest of mankind. The egoistic _ 
absorption of the individual in his own mental states, 
where the idea of doing good is banished from thought, or 
supplanted by a contempt for mankind generally, is an- 
tagonistic to the spirit of the Gospel. Self-purification is 
an end which the Christian sets before him; but he pur- 
sues it, not inthe way of mystic contemplation, but by 
the daily practice of all the virtues of character.’ 


What were the actual resources of Philosophy? What 
power had it to assuage grief, and to qualify the soul for 
the exigencies of life, and to deliver it from the fear of 


1 —roi¢ μὲν σπουδαίοις πρὸς τὸ ἀκρότατον καὶ τὸ ἄνω, τοῖς δὲ ἀνθρωπικω- 
τέροις, διττὸς αὖ ὧν, ὁ μὲν μεμνημένος ἀρετῆς μετίσχει ἀγαθοῦ τινος, ὁ δὲ 
φαῦλος ὄχλος οἷον χειροτέχνης τῶν πρὸς ἀνάγκην τοῖς ἐπιεικεστέροις.--- 
11:9: 

? Compare Neander, Wissenschaftl. Abhandll., p. 218. 


THE PRACTICAL INFLUENCE OF PHILOSOPHY. 181 


death? An instructive answer to this inquiry may be 
gathered from the works of Cicero. Whatever were his 
faults as a man, in the writings of no Roman of that age 
does there breathe a more enlightened spirit. The Stoic 
conception of the universal city is a familiar thought to 
him. That the individual is to live for mankind, and to 
restrict his sympathies by no narrower limit, he expressly 
affirms. Humanity, in the sense of a philanthropic regard 
for the race, is a word frequently upon his lips. Anti- 
theses like that of Greek and Barbarian, he declares to be 
contrary to truth and nature. A good man is not even to 
requite injuries, but to confine himself to the restraint of 
the aggressor. In his political course, however, and in 
dealing with ethical questions in the concrete, Cicero too 
often failed to exemplify these liberal maxims. There is a 
like failure to realize practically his religious theories. In 
his work on the Nature of the Gods, and in that on 
Divination, he shows the folly of polytheism, and of the 
cultus connected with it. He wishes that it were as easy 
to discover the truth as to confute error.' He is a Theist, 
preferring to follow Plato in the belief in a personal God, 
rather than the Stoics in their dogma of the impersonal 
spirit of nature. He finds in the wonderful order of the 
world irresistible evidence of the supreme Mind. He seesa 
corroboration of this faith in the concurrent judgments of 
men, as evinced in the universal prevalence of religion. 
Equally strenuous is he in maintaining that the soul is 
immaterial and immortal.2_ But we have the opportunity 
of testing the character of his convictions when he is 
brought into circumstances of keen distress. What was 
the practical force and value of these opinions? He com- 
posed the Tusculan Discussions when he was sixty-two 


1de Nat. Deorum, i. 32. 
2E. g. Disp. Tusc. I. xxvii, xxviii. 


182 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


years of age, after the death of his beloved daughter Tullia. 
Just after this heavy bereavement, he wrote a treatise on 
Consolation, for the purpose of alleviating his sorrow,—a 
treatise which is lost, but the general character of which 
he describes. The topics of the Tusculan Discussions are 
the Contempt of Death, on Bearing Pain, on Grief of 
Mind, on other Perturbations of Mind, on the Sufficiency 
of Virtue to make a man happy. In the perusal of these 
writings, we are struck with the distinctness with which 
the problems of life—the practical necessities of the soul, 
exposed as it is to affliction, and looking forward to death 
—are discerned and stated. We are equally impressed 
with the effort that is put forth to find a ground of rest. 
Ingenious reflections are brought forward, remedies against 
grief, which in Christianity are collateral and quite sec- 
ondary to the main sources of consolation. He says: 
“There are some who think with Cleanthes that the only 
duty of a comforter is to prove that what one is lament- 
ing is by no means an evil. Others, as the Peripatetics, 
prefer saying that the evil is not great. Others, with 
Epicurus, seek to divert your attention from the evil to 
good. Some think it sufficient to show that nothing has 
happened but what you had reason to expect; and this is 
the practice of the Cyrenaics. But Chrysippus thinks that 
the main thing in comforting is to remove the opinion 
from the person who is grieving, that to grieve is his 
bounden duty. There are others who bring together 
all these various kinds of consolation, as I have done 
myself in my book on Consolation ; for as my own mind 
was much disordered, I have attempted in that book to 
discover every method of cure.”! “The principal medi- 
cine to be applied in consolation is to maintain either 
that it is no evil at all, or a very inconsiderable one; the 
1 B. ii, 8231, 32. 


THE PRACTICAL INFLUENCE OF PHILOSOPHY. 183 


next best to that is to speak of the common condition 
of life, having a view, if possible, to the state of the person 
whom you comfort particularly. The third is that it is folly 
to wear yourself out with grief which can avail nothing.” 
He says in another place: ‘‘ In order to persuade those to 
whom any misfortune has happened that they can and ought 
to bear it, it is very useful to set before them an enumera- 
tion of other persons who have borne similar calamities.” ὦ 
To be sure, Cicero argues eloquently for the existence of 
God, and for the immortality of the soul. But when he is 
himself plunged into affliction, we find that neither he, nor 
his intimate friends who strive to console him, recur to 
truths of this nature. There is a striking contrast between 
the discourses composed for the public eye, and the familiar 
letters which passed between him and these friends. His 
correspondence with Servius Sulpicius, after Tullia’s death, 
is an impressive illustration of the small degree of practical 
power which these religious opinions or speculations had 
over the minds of such men. The Letter of Condolence 
which Sulpicius writes to Cicero is marked by refinement 
and tenderness. He adverts to the fall of the Republic, an 
event which had filled the cup of grief to the brim, so that 
no new event could increase the weight of calamity that had 
fallen ou his friend; to the ruins of four renowned Grecian 
cities, of which Corinth was one, which had met his eyes 
upon a recent voyage, aud which brought to mind dis- 
asters compared with which any loss that an individual 
could suffer is small; to the fact that Tullia had lived to 
witness her father’s public honors and fame; to the cir- 
cumstance that Cicero, who had sought to console others, 

1B. iii. 29, 

? Ceepi egomet mecum sic cogitare: Heus! nos homunculi indigna- 
mur, si quis nostrum interiit aut occisus est, quorum vita brevior esse 


debet; quum uno loco tot oppidorum cadavera projecta jacent ?—Serv. Sul- 
preius Creeron, F., iv. ὃ. 


184 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


would be charged with inconsistency if he himself gave 
way to sorrow. ‘These are among the prominent thoughts 
in this remarkable letter. Cicero, in his Reply, dilates 
upon the peculiar circumstances of aggravation that be- 
longed to his affliction, being deprived, as he was, of the 
occupation and diversion which arise from official employ- 
ment, and left without a solace at home.’ In neither of 
these letters is there the slightest reference to God, or to a 
future life. Cicero’s treatise on Old Age is another monu- 
ment of the vain attempt to elevate considerations which, 
when merely subordinate and auxiliary, have their value, 
into prime sources of consolation. How current the con- 
solatory reflections were, which are recited by Cicero, in 
his moral treatises, is evident from their familiar use by 
other writers. Plutarch, in his Letter of Consolation to 
Apollonius, who had lost a son, and in his Letter to his 
own wife after the death of his daughter, a child two years 
of age, incorporates some of these reflections. As usual, 
he inveighs against that Stoical apathy which “can never 
happen to a man without detriment; for as now the body, 
so soon the very mind would be wild and savage.” “A 
wise and well educated man,” he observes, in the first of these 
Letters, “must keep his emotions within proper bounds.” 
It is no unusual thing for a man to be afflicted ; Socrates 
was right in saying that if all of our misfortunes were laid 
in one common heap, most people would be content, instead 
of taking an equal share, to take their own and depart; the 
sufferer endures nothing but what is common to him with 
other men; how irrational to wonder when that perishes 
which by nature is perishable; we must call to mind the 
reasons which we have urged to our kinsmen when they were 
in trouble, and apply them to ourselves—these thoughts have 


1 When in exile, Cicero conceived of his calamities as altogether ex- 
ceptional.—See Epistt. ad Atticum, 111. 10, 15. 


THE PRACTICAL INFLUENCE OF PHILOSOPHY. 185 


ἃ prominent place in Plutarch’s Epistle. He intermingles 
references to the Providence of God which may have or- 
dained for us what is best, and to the possible felicity of 
another state of being. But the doctrine of the future life, 
even in Plutarch, is not set forth as a firm conviction, but 
only asa probability ; and he makes an argument in behalf 
of serenity, on the hypothesis, which is admitted to be not ab- 
solutely disproved, that death is the dissipation of our being, 
and the termination, therefore, of pain as well as of joy. Even 
outside of the limits of the Stoical school, there was a ten- 
dency to make much of natural fortitude and manliness as 
a means of counteracting sorrow. Plutarch himself says, 
that when evil comes “one must put on a masculine brave 
spirit, and so resolve to endure it.” ' Plato says that the 
principle which inclines us to recollection of our troubles 
and to lamentation, is “ irrational, indolent, and cowardly.” 
Weare not, “like children who have had a fall, to be keep- 
ing hold of the part struck and wasting time in setting up 
a howl.” Hence the emotional nature must not be in- 
dulged. For this reason the dramatic poets must be ex- 
cluded from the Republic. This poetry “ feeds and waters 
the passions instead of withering and starving them.” It 
evokes pity by showing us the calamities of others, and the 
result is that when we are afflicted we pity ourselves. ? The 
Stoic element which entered into the character of Socrates, 
an element which is quite discernible in Plato’s account of 
his apology to his judges, crops out occasionally in the 
Platonic dialogues, though connected with other tenets not 
consonant with the Stoical system. 

In Cicero’s time, and in the century that followed, faith 
in the immortality of the soul is mostly confined to minds 
imbued with the Platonic influence. We have adverted to 


* Consol, ad Apoll., 4. 
3 Republic, x, 606, (Jowett, 11, 448). 


186 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the gloomy disbelief that prevailed in a class of whom the 
elder Pliny is an example.’ The Epicureans were avowed 
free-thinkers, and at the close of the civil wars, the Epi- 
eurean creed was popular at Rome. We have already 
adverted to the fact that Julius Cesar, in an address 
to the Senate against the infliction of capital punish- 
ment upon the associates of Catiline, maintained that 
death would be a less severe penalty, since it would end 
all life and sensation ; the idea of a survival of the soul he 
treated as a chimera.? Tacitus, who was not without a 
belief in the existence of the gods, and in their providential 
agency, shows himself to be a doubting adherent of the 
opinion of Chrysippus that the souls of the most worthy 
survive until the final conflagration. In the beautiful 
apostrophe with which he closes the Life of Agricola, he de- 
sires that “if there be any habitation for the shades of the 
virtuous; if, as philosophers suppose, exalted souls do not 
perish with the body ;” the illustrious dead may repose in 
peace, and recall his kindred from vain laments to the 
contemplation of his virtues. 

In the second century, along with the revival of the 
ancient religion, and the restoration of political order, phi- 
losophy played a more important part as an educator among 
the Romans than it had ever done before.’ There had been 
not only a popular dislike of philosophers, but also a strong 
prejudice against any absorbing devotion to philosophical 
study, which was felt by persons like Tacitus, on the ground 
that it diverted men’s minds from the affairs of state, and 
made them poor citizens. For political reasons partly, 
from a sense of the dangerous tendency of philosophical 
thinking, philosophers had been repeatedly banished from 


1 See above, p. 182. 2 Sallust, B. c. 50. 


5. See, on this subject, Boissier, La Religion Romaine, etc., ii. 410 seq. 


THE PRACTICAL INFLUENCE OF PHILOSOPHY. 187 


Rome in the course of the first century ; but, after the death 
of Domitian, philosophy not only gained a toleration, but 
often received an effective personal patronage from the 
Emperors. There was still a popular antipathy from the 
supposed uselessness of’ studies and discussions of this na- 
ture, and from the Pharisaical character of many who were 
devoted to them. There was, also, a vehement opposition 
from the rhetoricians like Quintilian, who had to defend 
themselves against censorious criticism, and who claimed 
that ethics was embraced in their own art, since virtue was 
an essential quality of a true orator. A great number of 
the noblest minds embraced Stoicism, though the systems 
of Epicurus, and the Eclectic school were not without 
numerous adherents. Philosophers taught in schools, deli- 
vering lectures which were often received with great ap- 
plause, and taking under their oversight the entire conduct 
of the young men who adopted them as guides in the for- 
mation of character. Their exactions were sometimes severe, 
and their rebukes faithful. Besides the work of philoso- 
phers in this public capacity as the heads of schools, they 
exerted their influence in a more private relation. They 
were sometimes received into the families of the great in the 
character of spiritual advisers. As a pastor or confessor, 
the philosopher solved questions of duty, gave counsel, and 
administered consolation, in the household where he took 
up his abode. In certain cases, he accompanied to the place 
of execution, and soothed in the last moments of life, per- 
sons sentenced to death, ostensibly for political offences. 
If these household instructors, like chaplains in great fami- 
lies in more modern times, were, according to the descrip- 
tions of Lucian, occasionally subject to indignities, there is 
no doubt that not unfrequently they held a dignified and 
useful position. Princes associated with these philoso- 
phers for the sake of their instructive companionship. 


188 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


There was a certain class of philosophers, the Cynics, 
who engaged in a distinctively missionary work. Like 
mendicant friars, they perambulated the streets and high- 
ways, offering their doctrine and their rebukes to whomso- 
ever they chose to address. Hated and despised as they 
were, not unfrequently with good cause, there were not 
wanting among them individuals of a mild spirit, and of 
disinterested, noble aims. Epictetus, in one of his Dis- 
courses, has sketched the ideal of tiie Cynic Missionary.’ 
He who takes upon him this work, it is said, must not do 
it without divine guidance. He must not presumptuously 
take this office upon himself. He must divest himself of 
discontent, and of all the excitements of passion. He must 
purify his mind; learn to despise the body, and give up 
all dread of death. He must be, and feel himself to be, a 
messenger from Zeus to men, and must tell them the truth 
at all hazards. He must give up house, land, property, 
and external comforts of all sorts, and take up with the 
hardest fare. He must not return evil for evil, but as a 
brother love those who beat him. He must, as the ser- 
vant of Zeus, be indifferent to Cesar or to Proconsul. He 
must be without the distraction of worldly care—Epictetus 
uses the same word (ἀπερεσπάστως) with Paul (1 Cor. vii. 
35) —that he may be entirely attentive to the service of 
God; and for this reason he must abstain from marriage 
IIe must have a sound bodily constitution, so that his 
pure doctrine and exalted standard may not be attributed 
to the accident of bodily infirmity. He must be endowed 
with natural tact and acuteness. He must, above all, be 
free from every vice, with his reason clearer than the sun. 
Few, if any, fulfilled the lofty ideal which the Stoic sage 
presents of one who undertakes to reform and guide his 
fellow-men. Yet it is interesting to know that such an 


1 Diss., iii, 22. 


THE RELATION OF PHILOSOPHY TO CHRISTIANITY. 189 


ideal was exhibited, and that, here and there, an individual 
was found who made some near approach to the realiza- 
tion of it. 

Philosophy yielded a certain amount of strength and 
solace to able and cultivated men; an increased amount, 
we may say, among the Romans, in the second century, as 
compared with the age that witnessed the introduction of 
Christianity. The Stoics looked forward to a continuance 
for an indefinite, though limited period, of personal life 
beyond the grave. Platonists may not unfrequently have 
cherished a larger hope. But it must be remembered that 
philosophy exerted no appreciable influence on the mass 
of mankind, either in the way of restraint or of inspira- 
tion. They were left in the adversities of life, in sickness, 
in bereavement, and in death, to such consolation as was 
to be drawn from the old mythological system. The epi- 
taphs in memory of the dead in some cases betray a crass 
materialism, in other cases a bitter and resentful despair ; 
while many express a hope in behalf of the beloved who 
are gone, which is slow to be extinguished in the human 
heart. 


When we look back upon the ancient philosophy in its 
entire course, we find in it nothing nearer to Christianity 
than the saying of Plato that man is to resemble God. 
But, on the path of speculation, how defective and dis- 
cordant are the conceptions of God! And if God were 
adequately known, how shall the fetters of evil be broken, 
and the soul attain to its ideal? It is just these questions 
that Christianity meets through the revelation of God in 
Jesus Christ. God, the Head of that universal society on 
which Cicero delighted to dwell, is brought near, in all 
His purity and love, to the apprehension, not of a coterie 
of philosophers merely, but of the humble and ignorant. 


190 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


There is a real deliverance from the burden of evil, 
achieved through Christ, actually for Himself, and po- 
tentially for mankind. How altered in their whole cha- 
racter are the ethical maxims which, in form, may not be 
without a parallel in heathen sages! Forgiveness, forbear- 
ance, pity for the poor, universal compassion, are no longer 
abstractions, derived from speculation on the attributes of 
Deity. They are a part of the example of God. He has 
so dealt with us in the mission and death of His Son.? 
The Cross of Christ was the practical power that annihi- 
lated artificial distinctions among mankind, and made 
human brotherhood a reality. In this new setting, ethical 
precepts gain a depth of earnestness and a force of impres- 
sion which heathen philosophy could never impart. We 
might as well claim for starlight the brightness and warmth 
of a noon-day sun. 


1 See Col. iii. 12; Eph. iv. 32; 1 Pet. ii. 18; 2 Cor. x. 1; Luke xxii. 
27; John xiii. 14; 1 John iii. 16; 2 Cor. viii. 9; Eph. v. 2; Phil. ii. 7; 
anc the New Testament passim. 


THE MORALS OF HEATHENISM. 191 


CHAPTER VI. 
THE STATE OF MORALS IN ANCIENT HEATHEN SOCIETY. 


BENEATH the tranquillity that prevailed under the rule 
of Augustus Cesar, there appeared appalling signs of ex- 
haustion and decay in the central portions of the Roman 
Empire. The world was weary of strife, and resigned 
itself to the sway of a master who was supported by a 
standing army of 340,000 men, and who, by absorbing the 
various magistracies in his own person, knew how to com- 
bine the substance of absolute power with the forms of 
republican government. But the decay of that virile ener- 
gy, the loss of that virtue, which had carried Rome forward 
on its career of conquest, were visible on every hand. The 
civil wars, from the time of Sylla, had desolated the most 
flourishing regions of the Empire. The wars in Gaul had 
been attended with an enormous destruction of life in that 
country. Of these wars Plutarch says that Cesar had not 
pursued them for ten years “when he had taken by storm 
800 towns, subdued 300 states, and of the 3,000,000 of 
men who made up the gross sum of those with whom at 
several times he engaged, he had killed 1,000,000, and 
taken captive asecond.”' ‘This loss of population was par- 
tially made up by the large influx of Roman colonists. 
There were countries, like Sicily and Egypt, whose extra- 
ordinary fertility enabled them to recover rapidly from the 
devastating effects of war, and to furnish supplies of food 
to provinces whose agriculture was blighted. Greece, as a 


1 Vita Ceesaris, 


192 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


consequence of the Macedonian and Roman wars, was 
covered with ruins. The most of her renowned cities were 
reduced to villages. Corinth only, favored by its situa- 
tion, rose from its ashes, and gained rapidly in population 
and wealth—the increase of luxury and profligacy keeping 
pace with its growth. The nobler qualities of the Hellenic 
race had vanished. Still proud of their blood, dexterous, 
supple, unprincipled, and accomplished in the art of cater- 
ing to the appetite for amusement and sensual indulgence, 
they swarmed in Italy and Rome, and infected the whole 
atmosphere of domestic and social life with their pestiferous 
influence. Juvenal pours out his wrath at seeing “a Gre- 
cian capital in Italy,”’' and his scorn at 


ry 
ΠῚ 


“ΤᾺ flattering, cringing, treacherous, artful race, 
Of fluent tongue, and never-blushing face, 

A Protean tribe, one knows not what to call, 

That shifts to every form, and shines in all.” ? 


“‘ Greece,” he says, “‘is a theatre where all are players ;” 
this versatile, insincere, sensual race “‘ make all parts their 


1 


“non possum ferre, Quirites, 
Grecam urbem.” Sat. iii. 


2 These lines of Gifford are a free paraphrase of the original: — 
“ Ingenium velox, audacia perdita, sermo 
Promptus, et Iseo torrentior: ede quid illum 
Esse putes? quemvis hominem secum attulit ad nos: 
Grammaticus, Rhetor, Geometres, Pictor, Aliptes, 
Augur, Schcenobates, Medicus, Magus: omnia novit: 
Greeculus esuriens in Ccoelum, jusseris, ibit.” Sat. 11. 73-78. 


A-more literal rendering is that of Madan :— 
“A quick wit, desperate impudence, speech 
Ready, and more rapid than Iseus. Say—what do you 
Think him to be? He has brought us with himself what 
man you please : 

Grammarian, Rhetorician, Geometrician, Painter, Anointer, 
Augur, Rope-dancer, Physician, Wizard: he knows all things. 
A hungry Greek will go into heaven, if you command.” 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 193 


own ;” they cast an enchantment over all, and defile what- 
ever they touch. 

The population of Italy, like that of Greece, was 
diminishing. The slaughter of men in battle was a cause, 
but not the chief cause, of this remarkable fact. The country 
was blighted by slavery, to which more than to any other 
agency the fall of Rome was eventually due. In the room 
of the farmers who had once owned the soil which they 
tilled, and who had filled the Roman armies with hardy 
soldiers, were the few great proprietors, each with his throng 
of bondmen who toiled in the fields with fetters on their 
limbs. Thus the race of independent Italian yeomen was 
extirpated. It was one consequence of this calamitous 
change, that numerous acres, which had previously been 
cultivated with the plough and the spade, were turned into 
grazing land. The grain and the wine which had once 
been produced at home were now imported from abroad. 
Moreover, the small land-owners who had been left, were 
expelled from their homes, in large numbers, to give 
place to the disbanded soldiers of the legions of Augus- 
tus. These, disinclined to labor, and having no relish for 
their new abodes, parted with their property—thus en- 
larging further the estates of the great slave-holders— 
and resorted to Rome, to swell the multitude of vaga- 
bonds who rushed to the Capital from all quarters, for 
purposes of pleasure or crime, or in order to feed at 
the public crib. The population of Rome exceeded 
1,000,000, and, in the first half of the second century, pro- 
bably rose to double this number.’’* In the vast throng 
that crowded its narrow streets, which ran between houses 
built higher than in other ancient cities, were mingled the 
costumes of every nation, and the confused accents of a 


1 See Friedliinder, Sittengeschichte Roms., i.54 seq., where the calculae 
tions of Bunsen, Zumpt, Marquardi, and others are considered, 


194 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


hundred dialects. No small fraction of this motiey popu- 
lace was made up of the scum of all the provinces. Juve- 
nal complains that 


“Long since the stream that wanton Syria laves, 
Has disembogued its filth in Tiber’s waves.” 1 


A host of adventurers had come to insinuate themselves 
into the confidence of the great, and to step into their shoes.” 
Not less than 200,000 persons were supported by donations 
of money and provisions from the government. To these 
we are to add legions of mendicants, who picked up their 
living by beggary or theft, and lodged at night in the por- 
ticoes of temples and of other public edifices. There was 
never a more terrible contrast between the extremes of 
wealth and poverty, the opulence and luxury of the few, 
and the destitution of the many. Slavery had rendered 
all manual industry disreputable. Even Cicero takes this 
view, making an exception only in favor of the fine arts, 
where money is not the sole object of pursuit. Ordinary 
trade is stigmatized as unworthy ; teaching, and commerce 
on a large scale, he regards as not unbecoming. 

Of course, in forming an estimate of the state of morals 
at any given time, caution is requisite. The vehement re- 
bukes of an austere philosopher, and the humorous exag- 
gerations of a satirist, cannot be literally taken. We must 
guard against generalizing from exceptional instances of 
depravity. In the worst times of Rome, there were men 
of probity, and women of unsullied virtue. There were 
families bound together by tender affection. There were 
brave and generous actions, and examples of high courage 

1“ Jam pridem Syrus in Tiberim defluxit Orontes 
Et linguam et mores et cum tibicine chordas 


Obliquas nec non gentilia tympana secum 
Vexit et ad Circem jussas prostare puellas.” Sat. 111. 62-65. 


3 Viscera magnarum domuum dominique futuri.” Juvenal, Sat. 111. 78, 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 195 


and self-sacrifice for the public good. There were not want- 
ing individuals to protest against the baseness and corrup- 
tion of their age. And we must not overlook the extent 
of profligacy that may exist in our own day, in Christian 
countries, and especially in populous cities. But when all 
allowances are made, there can be no doubt that ancient 
society, at the particular period of which we are speaking, 
presented a scene of unexampled demoralization. “ To see 
the world in its worst estate we turn to the age of the sati- 
rists and of Tacitus, when all the different streams of evil, 
coming from east, west, north, south, the vices of barbarism 
and the vices of civilization, remnants of ancient cults, and 
the latest refinements of luxury and impurity, met and 
mingled on the banks of the Tiber.”* Some scholars have 
been disposed to deny that the mythological religion, 
through the stories of vice and crime perpetrated by the 
objects of worship, tended to corrupt the popular mind. It 
has been claimed that the noble and beautiful forms which 
art gave to the divinities must have exerted on their be- 
χ holders an elevating influence. But these same divinities 
“were believed to be capable of the worst forms of iniquity. 
What must have been the effect of this belief on the young? 
It is idle to call in question the judgment of Aristotle and 
Plato on this point. The latter, speaking of the stories in 
Homer about the heroes, as well as the deities, says: ‘“ They 
are likely to have a bad effect on those who hear them ; for 
everybody will begin to excuse his own vices when he is 
convinced that similar wickednesses are always being per- 
petrated by the kindred of the gods.”? But Homer was the 


1 Professor Jowett, Epistles of St. Paul, p. 75. 

2 Καὶ μὴν τοῖς ye ἀκούουσι βλαβερά" πᾶς yap ἑαυτῷ ξυγγνώμην ἕξει κακῷ 
ὄντι, πεισϑεὶς ὡς ἄρα τοιαῦτα πράττουσί τε καὶ ἔπραττον καὶ οἱ ϑεῶν ἀγχῖσ- 
ποροι͵, Ζηνὸς ἐγγύς, ete. Rep. iii. 391 (Jowett ii. 216). See, also, Aris- 
totle, Polit. vii. 17. 


196 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


one school-book of Grecian youth. Euthyphro justifies his 
treatment of his own father by appealing to the example of 
Zeus ; and Socrates, denying that the story is true, says that 
his rejection of these impious myths was at the bottom of the 
charge of impiety which wascommonly brought against him,' 
The causes of social demoralization in the age of Augustus 
were manifold; of the fact there is abundant evidence. 
When the Apostle Paul, in the opening of his Letter to the 
Romans, describes the hideous vices that prevailed among 
the heathen, he speaks as an eye-witness.” That terrible 
indictment is not more severe than the indignant assertions 
of Seneca. He compares society, where every one makes 
his profit by injuring somebody else, to the life of gladiators, 
who live together to fight each other. “All things,” he 
says, “are full of crimes and vices. More is perpetrated 
than can be removed by force. There is a struggle to see 
which will excel in iniquity. Daily the appetite for sin 
increases, the sense of shame diminishes. Casting away 
all respect for right and justice, lust hurries whithersoever 
it will. Crimes are no longer secret; they stalk before the 
eyes of men. Iniquity has so free a course in public, it so 
dominates in all hearts, that innocence is not only rare—it 
does not exist at all. It is not a case of violations of law 
in individual cases, few in number. From all sides, as at 
a given signal, men rush together, confounding good and 
evil.”3 He then proceeds to specify, in a long catalogue, the 


1 Euthyph., 5. (Jowett, i. 305.) 
2 Rom. i. 24-32. 


8 “Nunquam irasci desinet sapiens, si semel coeperit ; omnia sceleri- 
bus et vitiis plena sunt ; plus committitur, quam quod possit coercitione 
sanari. Certatur ingenti quodam nequitie certamine: major quotidie 
peccandi cupiditas, minor verecundia est. Expulso melioris zequiorisque 
vespectu, quocunque visum est, libido se impingit; nec furtiva jam 
scelera sunt; preter oculos eunt; adeoque in publicum missa nequitia 
est, et in omnibus pectoribus evaluit, ut innocentia non rara, sed nulla 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 197 


forms of iniquity, some of them revolting and unnatural 
crimes, which exhibited themselves on every hand. We 
must allow something for the spirit of declamation that 
belongs to the Roman philosopher; yet his testimony is 
borne out in its general tenor by other evidence. The 
contrast between the Rome of an earlier age, and Rome 
as it had then come to be, through these social evils, was 
a theme of indignant and sorrowful remark. It is true 
that the Roman community at the outset was virtuous, 
The people were temperate, industrious, and, after a man- 
ner, conscientious. The domestic, as well as the public 
virtues, prevailed. But after the power of Rome had 
spread, after the conquest of Carthage and Corinth, followed 
by the subjugation of the East and of Egypt; after the 
incoming of wealth, the acquaintance with Asiatic luxury 
and vice, the committal of the young to Greek pedagogues, 
the spread of Greek mythology and art, and the introduc- 
tion of the Greek stage, the old Roman character was 
broken down. The absence of a certain refinement, which 
belonged to the Greeks even when they were steeped in 
sensuality, led to an indulgence in loathsome excesses, such 
as gluttony, to which we find the Romans addicted. 


Tn considering the state of morals among the ancient na- 
tions, we single out certain topics for special remark." 


sit. Numquid enim singuli et pauci rupere legem? Undique, velut 
signo dato, ad fas nefasque, miscendum coorti sunt.” De Ira, ii. 8. 


1 On the morals of the ancient heathen society, see Tholuck’s Essays 
in Neander’s Denkwiirdigkeiten, vol. i. (1823); translated in the Bibl. 
Repository, vol. ii. Those essays, though presenting a mass of unques- 
tionable facts, were designed to exhibit the dark side of heathenism. 
The more pleasing features of ancient society Neander was to present in 
another essay, which, however, was not written. A plea for the benefi- 
cial influence of Greek art was made by F. Jacob, in his essay Ueber die 
Erziehung d. Hellenen zur Sutlichkeit, translated in the Classical Studies 
published by Sears, Edwards, and Felton (Boston, 1843). See, however, 


198 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


1. Immoralities connected with worship. Among various 
nations of antiquity, human sacrifices were in vogue. The 
Tyrians and Carthaginians threw children into the fire as 
an offering to Moloch. The Druidical priests in Gaul 
slaughtered human victims. In pre-historic times, human 
sacrifices had been practised by the Greeks and Romans. 
The far-famed story of Iphigenia is an illustration of this 
primitive custom. In later ages the Greek and Roman 
feeling did not countenance this sort of brutality. Yet 
isolated examples are recorded of the revival of the hor- 
rible custom. In the year 227 B. c., when it was found 
in the Sibylline books that Gauls and Greeks were destined 
to overpower the city, the Romans, in order to verify the 
prediction and thus to save themselves from ruin, caused a 
man and woman of these nations to be buried alive in the 
forum. It is said that Sextus Pompeius, at a time when 
a storm had shattered the fleet of his enemy, caused living 
men, as well as horses, to be cast into the sea as an offering 
to Neptune. A decree of the Senate, B.c. 95, had abo- 
lished human sacrifices; but the elder Pliny tells us that 
in his time they were still occasionally made. There seems 
to be reason to believe, although the fact has been doubted 
by some, that Augustus, after the surrender of Perusia, 
caused 300 captives to be sacrificed on the altar of Julius. ! 

Licentiousness entered into the rites of heathen worship. 
Prostitution was not made a part of religious service 
among the Babylonians and other Semitic peoples alone. 


Gieseler’s criticism upon Jacob’s view, Kirchengesch. I. 29, n. 1. There 
is a full discussion of the subject by Dr. Dillinger in his Heidenthum u. 
Judenthum. But the facts adduced by this learned writer are not always 
strictly verifiable. LLampoons and gossip were not more trustworthy in 
ancient times than they are now. Compare the anecdotes of Julius Ce- 
sar taken up by Déllinger (p. 719) from Suetonius, with the remarks of 
Merivale, History of the Romans, ii. 390. 
1 Suet., Octav. 15, Seneca, de Clem., i. 11 (“post Perusinas aras”’). 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 199 


It was practised, likewise, in honor of Aphrodite at 
Corinth. The indecent songs, symbols, and revelry, which 
attended the Bacchanalian and other festivals, cannot be 
mentioned in detail. ‘The Bacchie orgies were carried by 
the Greeks to Etruria, and being thence transferred to 
Rome, led to most indecent and iniquitous excesses; so 
that the consuls, in the year 189 B. c., interfered to sup- 
press ceremonies that involved murder, as well as gross 
debauchery. At that time, seven thousand persons in 
Rome were united in the practice of these frightful orgies. 
Livy states that subsequently a Pretor condemned to 
death, in one year, 3,000 persons on the charge of poison- 
ing, where crime was mixed up with religion.’ The 
Romans, notwithstanding their earlier regard for decency, 
admitted rites of an opposite character. Mythological 
stories, which were adapted to excite the baser propensities, 
were represented in pictures and statues, and swelled the 
tide of corruption which beat with ever increasing force 
against the ancient barriers of chastity and order. . 

2. The character and position of women. In Greece, 
women enjoyed relatively less freedom, and less influence 
in their families, in the age of Pericles than in the Homeric 
period. Little pains were taken with their education. 
Before their marriage, they were kept in seclusion, and 
under watch. After their marriage, they managed their 
households, governed ‘their children and slaves; but they 
had their own apartments, separate from the husband, 
and seldom left their dwellings. They ate at the same 
table with their husbands, but did not do this when he 
had guests, nor did they go out with him when he took 
_meals with his friends abroad. The purity of the wife 
and mother was guarded by strict laws; but the utmost 
laxity in this respect was allowed to males. Higher ideas 


1Livy xxxi. 8-19. See Déllinger, p. 482. 


200 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


in regard to the education of females, and the relation of 
the wife to the husband, are found in Plato and Plutarch. 
But Plato was so far governed by the prevalent view 
that the prime object of the marriage relation was to raise 
up citizens, strong in body as well as of sound mind, 
and was so oblivious of the spiritual nature of marriage, 
that he makes a community of wives one characteristic 
of the ideal republic. Cultivated Greeks made com- 
panions of the heteere, or courtesans, who were sometimes 
witty and educated. So innocent was the occupation of 
this class of persons deemed to be that we find Socrates 
making a visit to Theodota, who was one of them, and 
giving her advice on the best means of prosecuting her 
business of winning and keeping “ friends.”? The pro- 
fligacy that reigned in the declining age of Grecian his- 
tory is illustrated in the story of Phryne. This famous 
courtesan amassed such wealth that she could offer to build 
the walls of Thebes. Praxiteles and Hyperides were 
among her adorers; and when she was charged with Athe- 
ism, the latter secured her acquittal by bidding her unveil 
her bosom to the eyes of the judges. Finally at Eleusis, 
in the presence of myriads of spectators from all Greece, 
she personated Venus by entering naked into the waves. 
In Rome, the wife from the first had a higher position 
in the household. Notwithstanding the absolute authority 
in the family, which was conceded to the husband, she was 
more his companion. Matrons of the type of Cornelia 
were a subject of patriotic pride. Matrimonial fidelity was 
for a long period remarkably observed. The Romans 
boasted that for the first five hundred years of their his- 
tory, there was no instance of divorce. But the old senti- 
ments rapidly passed away under the influence of Hellen- 
ism, and in the general decline of Roman character. As 


1 Plutarch, de Amore, 24, 25. 2 Xenophon, Mem., iii. 11. 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 201 


early as 131 B.c., Metellus Macedonicus, who was held in 
general admiration for his honorable domestic life, in a 
speech described marriage as an oppressive burden which 
citizens would gladly be clear of, but which they were 
bound to undertake from a sense of duty.’ Divorce be- 
came more and more common. Marcus Cato did not 
hesitate to part from his wife, with the consent of her 
father, and to hand her over to his friend, Hortensius ; 
and then, after his death, to marry her again.? The form 
of marriage which involved the stricter legal and religious 
sanctions, gradually disappeared, and marriages without 
the manus, admitting of easy separation, became universal. 
Divorces came to be events of every-day occurrence. . Cicero 
divorced his wife, with whom he had lived for thirty years, 
and married a young woman of wealth. Her, also, he 
soon divorced. Seneca speaks of “illustrious and noble” 
women who reckoned time not by the number of the con- 
suls, but by the number of their successive husbands. 3 
Meantime, seduction and adultery spread until Roman so- 
ciety had become a sink of pollution. “ Liaisons in the 
first houses,” says Mommsen, “had become so frequent, 
that only a scandal altogether exceptional could make them 
the subject of special talk; a judicial interference seemed 
now almost ridiculous.” * The Roman aristocracy, in the 
warm season, flocked to the watering-places of Bais and 
Puteoli, where women mixed in political intrigues, and, 
with young effeminate Roman fops at their side, devoted 
themselves to the amusements and vices peculiar to these 
places of fashionable resort. The stage acquired an irre- 
sistible fascination, and women belonging to high families 
appeared upon it as dancers. Jt was one feature of this 


* See Mommeen, iii. 502. 2 Plutarch, Cato Min., vii. 57. 
5. De Beneficiis, iti. 16. * Mommsen, iv. 618. 


202 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


demoralized condition of society that men refused to marry. 
They preferred an illicit gratification of the senses, and 
shrank from the burdens incident to a connection with 
such women as were open to their choice, addicted as 
they were to habits of profuse expenditure. The efforts 
of Augustus to promote marriages by legal enactments, 
which offered bounties to those who would take wives, had 
little effect. Where marriages took place, the‘children 
were few in number, and parents preferred, for pecu- 
niary reasons, to remain almost or altogether childless. 
Such parents could quote the authority of Cato who said, 
that it was the “duty of a citizen to keep great wealth 
together, and therefore not to beget too many children.”? 
If a tithe of what Juvenal and contemporary writers say 
on this matter is true, licentiousness pervaded all ranks 
of Roman society. The example was furnished in the 
imperial family. One has only to remember the almost 
incredible wickedness of Messalina, the wife of Claudius [., 
as she is described by Tacitus, to learn to what an unex- 
ampled abyss of profligacy a Roman woman of the highest 
rank could descend.? The multitudes of slaves presented 
an ever present temptation to sensual indulgence. This 
degradation of woman, this all-pervading impurity, be- 
longed to the provinces as well as the capital. 


3. Inucury and Extravagance. Friedliinder maintains 
that the common representations on this point are exagger- 
ated. Too much has been built upon exceptional inci- 
dents of wild extravagance, as, for example, the stories of 
costly pearls dissolved, and swallowed from the goblet, in 
some fit of mad caprice. The monstrous prodigality of 
certain emperors, as Nero and Caligula, is not to be attri- 


1 Mommeen, iv. 613. 
? Tacitus, Annal. xi. 26, 27; Dio Cassius, lx. 18, 31. 
3 See Die Sittengesch. Roms., iii. 1 seq. 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 203 


buted to their subjects, nor even to other emperors, some of 
whom, like Vespasian, were noted for frugality. If the 
Romans sought for new delicacies for the table, one conse- 
quence was that they were led to naturalize in Italy a great 
variety of animals and plants which are useful for food. 
Even the vine, with the art of cultivating it, had been trans- 
planted at an earlier day from Greece. What was censured by 
the men of austere views is often something connected with 
food or dress which no one objects to at present. For ex- 
ample, Pliny and Seneca inveigh against the use of snow 
for cooling drinks, as an unnatural luxury. It was then 
something new ; but so far from being considered a super- 
fluity, ice has become an article of indispensable con- 
venience, especially in southern latitudes. The entertain- 
ments of the higher class of Romans, their wardrobes, 
their silver, and jewels, when compared with what is wit- 
nessed now among the rich, hardly justify the ordinary 
judgment. Neither were the incomes of rich persons in 
private life then larger than the incomes of individuals of 
the same class in Europe and America now. Anecdotes 
relating to Roman habits may create astonishment, when 
in truth due examination will show that they are not 
without a parallel in modern society. It must be remem- 
bered, however, that the Romans had been a frugal people, 
living upon the products of their own soil. The influx 
of commodities from every quarter of the globe, through 
conquest and commerce, produced a vast and rather sud- 
den revolution in their habits. It may be true that bills 
of fare of grand feasts at Rome do not display a more pro- 
fuse variety of meats and viands than a Lord Mayor’s din- 
ner. But unless all testimonies are false, there was a 
coarse appetite for food, a gluttony, which finds no analogy 
in the higher circles of modern society. To pay two hun- 
dred and fifty dollars for a single fish—the mullet—was 


204 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


no doubt unusual ; yet occasional instances of this kind 
throw light upon the drift of social habits at the time 
when they occurred. The humorous passage in which 
Juvenal describes the assembling of the chiefs of state, at 
the call of Domitian, to determine how a turbot should be 
cooked, is equally significant. | The reader of Cicero’s 
letters will remember the description of his reception of 
Julius Czesar at his country villa, where it is incidentally 
mentioned that the Dictator took an emetic in connec- 
tion with his dinner.” It was no uncommon thing for 
Roman gentlemen to take this method of relieving the 
stomach of its contents, in order that they might indulge 
the appetite with impunity, or prolong the pleasures of 
the table beyond the wants or capacity of nature.* There 
is no evidence that this loathsome custom was, usually 
at least, from a sanitary motive, not connected with in- 
temperance in eating. Suppers were extended far into the 
night. Female slaves waited on the tables, attired in a way 
to excite the passions of the guests whom they served ; and 
when they were inflamed with wine, dancing-girls were 
introduced, and a scene of coarse revelry ensued. The 
enormous expenditure in baths, in villas with their gardens 
and fish-ponds, in magnificent sepulchres, and in works of 
art of every description, needs no illustration. The 
sumptuary laws which were frequently issued, but which 
were violated by those who made them, testify to a general 
sense of the fact that a headlong passion for luxurious living 
was breaking through the bounds of propriety and of tra- 
ditional custom. Speaking of the later days of the Re- 
public, Mommsen says :* “ Extravagant prices, as much as 


1 Sat. iv. 

? This passage is quoted in Forsyth’s Life of Cicero, ii. 167. 

5 Compare Seneca, ad Helviam: “ Vomunt ut edant, edunt ut yomant.” 
{Ὑ0]. 11]. ».. 501. 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 205 


100,000 sesterces (£1,000) were paid for an exquisite 
cook. Houses were constructed with special reference to 
this object.” “A dinner was already described as poor, at 
which the fowls were served up to the guests entire, and 
not merely the choice portions.” “ At banquets, above all; 
the Romans displayed their hosts of slaves ministering to 
luxury, their bands of musicians, their dancing-girls, their 
elegant furniture, their carpets glittering with gold, or pic- 
torially embroidered, their rich silver plate”? Luxury 
went on increasing in defiance of all laws designed to curb 
it. It should be observed that the period when luxury and 
extravagance were at their height includes the latter days 
of the Republic, and the century that followed the battle of 
Actium, extending to the reign of Vespasian. 

4, Unnatural Vice and Pollution. In any comparison of 
ancient society with Christian times, it is impossible to pass 
over in absolute silence practices too revolting to admit of 
more than a passing allusion.‘ The unnatural sensuality 
on which the Apostle Paul poured out his indignant repro- 
bation, in the first chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, 
prevailed to a frightful extent among the Greeks, and was 
taught by them to the Romans. In Greece the passion for 
beautiful boys (zacdspaotta) was relieved, in some slight 
degree, of its grossness, by an infusion of zesthetic sentiment. 
This kind of love, springing in part from the adoration of 
beauty, assumed all the characteristics of a sentimental 
attachment between persons of different sexes. Assiduous 
devotion to the object beloved, rivalship, jealousy, despair— 
all the phenomena of courtship and love—were connected 
with this unnatural relation, and served to cloak, even to 
the eyes of philosophers, the shameless indecency that be- 
longed to it. There is scarcely a writer of Greece who 


1 The facts and the evidence are presented by Déllinger and by 
Tholuck. See above, p. 197, n. 1. 


206 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


directly condemns it. One effect of it was to disincline 
men to marriage, as both Plato and Plutarch remarked ; 
and so this disgusting vice contributed to the reduction of 
the population of Greece, as well as to the moral ruin of 
her people. Like most other Greek vices, this form of 
impurity took root and flourished in Rome. Statesmen, 
judges, generals, and emperors were guilty of it. At the 
end of the sixth century, A. U. C., Polybius states that many 
Romans paid as high as a talent ($1000) for a beautiful boy. 
Cicero speaks of a case in which the sons of Senators, and 
youth from the highest families, obtained from the judges 
an acquittal, which a bribe of money could not procure, by 
this species of prostitution. Slaves were more commonly 
the victims of this base affection. All pains were then 
taken to stunt their growth and preserve their fresh and 
effeminate appearance; and the same thing was done in the 
case of free persons. The fact that stories imputing the vice 
of which we are speaking to a man like Julius Cesar, were 
in circulation, and formed a matter for jesting,’ even if the 
stories were false, shows the measure of toleration that 
was granted to practices which in modern times, would 
render the perpetrator of them an outcast and an object of 
loathing. ? 

5. Infanticide. That sense of the sacredness of human 
life which prevails at the present day, is due to Christianity, 
and did not exist in the same degree among the nations of 
antiquity. We might refer to the cruelty that belonged to 
ancient warfare, as an illustration. The lives, as well as 
the property, of the captured were a forfeit to the conquer- 
or, and those who were spared were sold into slavery. 
The surrender of a town, especially if it had made a stub- 
born resistance, was the signal for an indiscriminate mas- 


1 Suetonius, Owsar, 49, 73. 
2 See Prof. Jowett’s remarks, Epistles of St. Paul, p. 75. 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 207 


sacre. Little heed was paid to the distinction between 
combatants, and the peaceful inhabitants for whom they 
fought—a distinction which a Christian civilization has at 
length fully established. A scene like that witnessed at 
the sack of Magdeburg by Tilly would have caused no 
surprise in ancient times. It would have been a merciful 
treatment of a conquered town. How often do we meet in 
the writers of antiquity statements of which the following 
is a specimen: “ When our soldiers had entered the town, 
Cesar sold at auction the entire spoil. He was informed 
by the purchasers that the number of heads”—people 
sold to the Roman merchants as slaves—“ was fifty-three 
thousand.” ! 

Practices like these might be the natural result of the 
prevalent ideas of the treatment due to an enemy. But 
the custom to which we have now to advert could plead 
no such apology. It rested upon other, and, to say the 
least, equally repulsive maxims. 

The right of parents to destroy the offspring which it 
was not thought expedient for them to bring up, was re- 
cognized in law and practice. Sometimes such children 
were left by the Greeks to perish by starvation in some 
desolate place ; sometimes they were killed outright. The 
moral teachers of Greece did not rise above the popular 
feeling on this subject. Aristotle approves of the custom 
of exposing infants where it is desired to prevent an excess 
of population ; and, if, in any state, this is forbidden, he 
recommends abortion as a substitute.” Plato, in the Re- 
public, holds that children of bad men, illegitimate chil. 
dren, and children of parents too far advanced in years, 
should be destroyed by exposure; the state is not to be 
burdened with them.* Among the Romans there had 


1 Bell. Gall., 11. 23. 2 Aristot., Polat. vii. 14, 16. 
5. Rep., v. 459, 460. 


208 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


been originally a law forbidding the destruction of infants ; 
but this law became practically obsolete. This kind of 
murder was tolerated and practised. Suetonius, describ- 
ing the popularity of Germanicus, states that on the oc- 
casion of his death, and in honor of him, new-born in- 
fants were exposed.’ Abortion, which was sanctioned by 
Aristotle and Plato, became very common among the Ro- 
mans, to escape the pains of child-birth, and especially to 
get rid of the trouble of rearing children. Customs which 
found their only apology at the start in the ancient feeling 
that the state must be furnished with the right number of 
able-bodied citizens, came to rest at last upon the cruel and 
ignoble desire to avoid the burdens of the family. 


6. Slavery. In the principal states of Greece the number 
of slaves was far in excess of that of the free population. 
In Attica, at the beginning of the fourth century, B. ¢., 
there were 20,000 free citizens, 10,000 foreign settlers who 
were protected by the State, and 400,000 slaves. In Sparta, 
the number of actual slaves was relatively less, but if all 
whose condition differed little from that of servitude were 
counted, the ratio of freemen to bondmen was not materi- 
ally different. In Corinth there were said to be 46,000 
slaves, and on the island of A®gina, at one time, 470,000 ; 
but this must have been before Athens became the centre 
of commerce.2._ There were great slave markets, as Ephe- 
sus, Samos, Athens,—which supplied all Greece. Strabo 


1 Caligula, 5. 


2 This is the statement of Ctesicles (ap. Athen. vi. p. 272 c.: see Smith, 
Dict. of Gr. and Roman Antig., p. 1035.) Déllinger (Judenth. u. Hei- 
denth.), p. 674,) is probably wrong in excluding female slaves from this 
estimate. Slaves being reckoned as property, all were counted. Not 
so in the case of citizens and metics. Boeckh (Public Economy of 
Athens, p. 55) estimates the number of slaves in Athens, including 
women and children, at 365,000. Compare the discussion in Wallon, 
Est. de 1) Esclavage dans 0 Antiquité, vol. i. 6. viii. 


THE MORAIS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 209 


states that in his time tens of thousands of slaves were 
landed by the Cilician pirates on the island of Delos, in one 
day. The treatment of slaves by the Greeks was milder 
than by the Romans.’ Only those who labored in the 
mines worked in fetters; but this class were numerous. 
The Spartan Helots, who were serfs, attached to the soil, 
were treated with cruelty in later times, when there was 
more fear from their insubordination. Thucydides says 
that on one occasion ten thousand of them were persuaded 
to come forward by the promise of emancipation, and were 
then treacherously murdered.? Slaves in Greece always 
testified under torture. The master might not kill his 
slave, but he could beat him so far as to make him a crip- 
ple. There was no protection for the chastity of female 
slaves. When weary of them, their owners might let them 
or sell them to houses of prostitution. 


The stern character of the Roman law appeared in the 
powers which it gave to the slaveholder.* He was clothed 
with absolute authority ; he could beat, maim, and kill his 
slave with impunity. The slave could own no property, 
he could contract no marriage; whatever connection he 
was allowed to form with a woman was dissolved at the 
command of his owner. Slaves, when they were allowed 
or forced to give testimony, were examined under the tor- 
ture. Ifa master was murdered by a slave, the vengeance 
of the law was visited upon all the slaves of his household, 
who were crucified without mercy. Slaves were brought 
from all directions, but in the largest numbers from Asia. 


When King Nicomedes of Bithynia was called upon by 


‘On the whole subject of slavery among the Greeks, see Becker, 
Charicles, Th. ii., p. 20 seq. 

? Hist., B.iv. 80. 

* Upon the characteristics of Roman slavery, see Becker, Gallus, 
Excurs. iii. 


210 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Marius to furnish his contingent of auxiliaries, he answered 
that all his able-bodied subjects had been dragged off into 
slavery by Roman tax-gatherers. Every Roman of mode- 
rate means felt a pride in owning at least a few slaves. 
There were individuals who owned from ten to twenty 
thousand, most of them field hands. A freedman in the 
-reign of Augustus, who had lost many slaves, was still 
able at his death to leave 4,116. Many households were 
possessed of as many as 500. The slaves in a family were 
divided into groups, to each of which a special function 
was assigned. Among them were included carpenters, 
secretaries, physicians, and architects. The architects and 
carpenters of Crassus numbered 500. There was nothing 
to prevent an irritable or drunken master from wreaking 
his resentment upon a slave, except the pecuniary loss, 
which, as the market was glutted, was usually small. A 
slave who had given offence might be sent to the arena, or 
flung to the fishes. The females appear to have been as 
cruel and oppressive in the treatment of their servants 
as the men. Juvenal speaks of those who hire a beadle 
by the year to lash their servants, and let him go on 
with his work until he drops the scourge in weariness. 
A woman of hot temper orders a slave to be crucified 
without caring to inquire whether he may not be inno- 
cent. A petulant female lays the whip over the bare 
shoulders of the trembling maid who is dressing her hair. ' 
Cato’s mode of treating his slaves is well known. To 
prevent them from conspiring together, he sowed dis- 
sension and fomented quarrels among them. After a sup- 
per where he had sat with his guests, he took his whip 
and chastised the servants who had failed to do their part 
to his satisfaction. Worse than all, the old slaves, who 
could no longer work, he sold for what he could get for 


2 Sat. vi. 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 211 


them. Generally speaking, slaves were considered, and 
justly considered, as at heart enemies of the master. In 
the country, they worked by day in chains, and at night 
were lodged in the ergastula—apartments excavated under 
ground, Slaves were numerous almost everywhere in the 
Roman empire, but nowhere was the number so great in 
proportion to the population as in Rome. Zumpt estimates 
that at the beginning of the Christian era there were two 
slaves to one freeman. When we consider the almost irre- 
sistible tendency to demoralization among the slaves them- 
selves, the temptations to perfidy, licentiousness, and almost 
every other vice to which they were exposed, and when we 
consider the baleful influence which fell, from the unli- 
mited control of all these human beings, upon the masters, 
and the contamination of the young by their familiarity 
with slaves, from the beginning of life, we shall feel that 
the amount of evil resulting from Roman slavery is beyond 
calculation." 


7. Roman Amusements,—the Stage, the Circus, and the 
Arena, 

The vast proletariate in Rome were not only hungry, 
and needed to be fed, but were idle, and needed to be 
amused. Bread and games—Panem et Circenses—were 
the two things to which they felt they had a right. But 
the public shows and games became an engrossing passion 
of the entire populace. The emperors found it well to oc- 
cupy thus the attention of the people, who were diverted in 
this way from thoughts of liberty. The great gatherings in 
the circus and amphitheatre took the place of the as- 
semblies where the Romans had chosen their magistrates 


1 Compare Wallon, ii. c. ix. (Influences de l’Esclavage sur les classes 
libres). 

2 See, on this whole topic, Friedlander ii. 263-481 (Die Schauspiele), 
from whom many of the statements which follow have been drawn. 


212 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


and regulated public affairs. The battles of the arena 
supplied the place of the contests by which Rome had ex- 
tended her sway over the world. The exciting perform- 
ances in the Circus between the Palatine and Aventine, re- 
minded the spectators of the triumphal processions, laden 
with the spoils of kingdoms, which, for a succession of 
centuries, had marched over the same ground. In these 
public places, the emperors showed themselves to their 
subjects and heard from them expressions of popular 
feeling. 

The theatre was too tame to rival the more stirring ex- 
hibitions of the circus and the arena. Yet theatrical per- 
formances had a powerful attraction, and exerted a vast 
influence. The character of these went from bad to worse. 
Tragedy, which interested only a minority of cultivated 
persons, could scarcely maintain itself, and found itself 
obliged to depend for what success it had upon showy 
scenic representations, in which elephants, giraffes, and other 
animals, with gorgeously attired men and women, passed 
in glittering procession across the stage. The Greek 
comedy, and the Roman plays of the same order, had a 
larger measure of popular favor. The subjects of the 
comedy were borrowed largely from the licentious stories 
of the Greek mythology. But the Pantomime gradually 
usurped the place of almost every other species of dramatic 
performance. The art of expression through movement 
and gesture was carried to a marvellous perfection. The 
dancers were beheld with an enthusiasm which knew no 
bounds ; and as the mimes were commonly of an unchaste 
and even obscene character, they had the most corrupting 
effect upon the morals of women and of youth. 

The Circus, in Julius Cesar’s time, furnished seats for 
150,000 men. ‘Titus added seats for 100,000 more, and in 
the fourth century there were places for not less than 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 213 


385,000. 1 Here were foot-races, feats upon horse-back, 
such as may be seen in the modern circus, and other like 
amusements. But the chief thing was the chariot race. 
About this contest the most interest was gathered. The 
several combatants were put in, and the chariots and horses 
owned, by companies—four in number—and thus arose 
the factions of the circus, each having its characteristic 
color, and enlisting with the most ardent feeling in behalf 
of its favorite. Thus the keenest excitement, such as might 
be evoked by matters of grave and serious moment, was 
kindled in all classes by a horse-race. When nobles of 
ancient lineage, and emperors themselves, when even wo- 
men, entered personally into the contests of the cireus and 
the amphitheatre, the prostration of Roman dignity and 
virtue seemed complete. ~ 

The gladiatorial contests, in which living men, often in 
large numbers, were set to fight in deadly combat with 
one another, and with wild beasts, for the amusement of 
spectators of both sexes, and of every age and rank, are a 
most impressive sign of the state of moral feeling in the soci- 
ety which beheld these bloody games with increasing delight. 
It was not until five hundred years after the building of 
the city, that these games were introduced from Campania 
and Etruria. They took place in connection with funeral 
ceremonies, and in honor of deceased friends. First, in 264 
B. C., at the obsequies of D. Junius Brutus, three pairs con- 
tended in the cattle market. In 216 8. c., at the funeral 
of M. Aimilius Lepidus, 22 pairs contended in the forum. 
In 174 8. c., Titus Flaminius, on the death of his father, 
caused 74 pairs to fight for three days. As the passion for 
these contests increased, demagogues and magistrates vied 
with each other in their efforts to minister to it. Julius 
Cesar, as Atdile (65 B. c.), caused not less than 320 pairs 


1 Friedlander, ii. 294 (3d ed.). 


214 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


to fight. At the games which Augustus instituted in his 
reign, 10,000 men joined in these combats. Trajan, in 106 
A. D., after his victories on the Danube, caused gladiatorial 
fights to be continued for four months, in which 10,000 
combatants took part. Besides the games which were 
given by public authority and by the emperors, there were 
others, often on a large scale, which were provided by 
private individuals at their ownexpense. Theamphitheatres, 
with their circular walls and elliptical arena, grew in their 
dimensions as the relish for these games increased, until, in 
the last decade of the first century, the gigantic Coliseum 
arose, the stupendous ruins of which still remain. The 
gladiators were condemned criminals, prisoners of war, 
slaves, and others who were hired, or volunteered, to 
fight. In the first century, a master might sell his slaves 
for this purpose. It was a common punishment for slaves 
who had incurred the displeasure of their owners. Gangs of 
gladiators were kept by private persons, and either exhi- 
bited by them, or let to such as wished to hire them. In 
some cases they broke out in fierce mutiny; in other cases 
they manifested a strong attachment to their owners. In 
the last days of the Republic, they often served their mas- 
ters as body-guards, or braves. The emperors established 
gladiatorial schools in various places for the training of com- 
batants for the arena. Immense edifices were constructed 
for this purpose, each of these establishments being provided 
with a corps of officials for its management, and with phy- 
sicians, surgeons, fencing-masters, workmen for the manu- 
facture and repair of weapons, and other persons employed 
in various capacities. The gladiators were subjected to a 
rigid training, and a careful diet, and lodged in cells from 
which they could not escape.’ On the day before they were 


1 In the ruins of Pompeii, skeletons of gladiators have been found with 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 215 


to enter the arena, they were treated to a supper in com- 
mon. There some sent messages, which probably might be 
the last, to their friends, others gave themselves up reck- 
lessly to the gratification of the appetite, and Christians 
turned the occasion into a fraternal love-feast. Almost 
incredible statements are made as to the number of animals 
which were brought into the amphitheatre to be hunted 
there, and to mangle and devour human beings. In the 
festival of a hundred days for the dedication of the 
᾿ Coliseum, Titus is said to have brought into the arena 
5000 wild beasts of every kind. In the festivals lasting 
for four months, under the auspices of Trajan, in 106 a. 
D., 11,000 tame and wild animals were slain. It had cre- 
ated astonishment when Sylla presented a hundred lions; 
but this achievement was of little account in comparison 
with what was done afterwards. Animals were hunted 
and caught in the remotest regions; even the crocodile and 
hippopotamus, and other beasts extremely difficult to 
transport, as the giraffe, were brought together for the 
amusement of the Roman populace. The arrangements of 
the amphitheatre were adapted to excite in the highest 
degree, and almost to bewilder, the spectators. The citizens 
were obliged to wear the white toga. The lower seats were 
set apart for the senators, in the midst of whom was the 
gallery of the imperial family ; next above them were the 
equestrian order; higher still the body of citizens, the 
women sitting apart from the males; and to the topmost 
benches the rabble were admitted. Over the immense 
multitude, who thus encompassed the arena, was stretched 
an awning, parti-colored and reflecting its various hues 
upon the ground beneath. Strains of instrumental music 
preceded and accompanied the contests, which were intro- 


iron fetters upon them, who, not being able to fly, were slowly buried 
under the ashes of Vesuvius, . 


216 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


duced by a procession of gladiators around the arena, when 
the greeting may have been addressed to the Emperor: 
“‘ Ave, Caesar, Imperator, morituri te salutant!’”? When 
a combatant was struck down, the victor appealed to 
the assembly of spectators to decide the fate of his 
fallen antagonist. Menials touched the slain with hot 
irons to see that death was not simulated. They were 
dragged out to the dead-room, where those in whom life 
was not extinct were despatched. At intervals, servants 
appeared to spade up the ground, saturated with blood, 
and to spread over it a new coating of sand. The diver- 
sions of the amphitheatre were far from being limited to 
conflicts between men, or between men and animals, or 
among animals themselves. By ingenious and elaborate 
machinery, a stage could be nade to rise from beneath the 
ground, and then suddenly, with the men, and beasts and 
whatever else was upon it, to sink out of sight. At the 
appointed moment, a platform would fall to pieces, and 
the man, who was standing upon it, would drop into a 
cage of wild beasts, and be instantly torn in pieces before 
the eyes of all. The boys and girls would be pleased with 
the gilded apparel and bright crown of one who came for- 
ward in the arena, when they would see the flames burst 
forth from his dress, and bebold him leaping and writhing 
in agony until death ended his torture. ’ 


The Romans were not satisfied with seeing men engage 
in mortal combat in pairs and squads. They wanted to 
see earnest fighting, and bloodshed on a larger scale. 
Spectacles of this nature, therefore, were presented to them. 
Julius Ceesar celebrated his triumph by an actual battle of 
this sort in the Circus, where there fought on each side 500 
footmen, 800 cavalry, and 20 elephants with men in 


! Plutarch, de sera Numinis Vindicta, 9. 


THE MORALS OF HEATHEN SOCIETY. 217 


towers upon their backs. This was only one of ἃ series 
of bloody encounters between large bodies of men, which 
the emperors caused to take place for the diversion of the 
populace. Julius Cesar, in the year 46 B. Ο., as a part 
of his triumphal games, caused a lake to be dug out on 
Mars’ Field, and a sea-fight to take place upon it between 
a Tyrian and an Egyptian fleet, in which were a thousand 
soldiers, and two thousand oarsmen. Augustus gave 
another sea-fight, upon an artificial lake, made in Cxesar’s 
garden, on the other side of the Tiber, where three thou- 
sand soldiers were engaged. These and various other 
battles upon the water were thrown into the shade by the 
great sea-fight which Claudius caused to take place on 
Lake Fucinus, at the completion of a public work there, 
where, under the eyes of an innumerable multitude that 
covered the neighboring shores and hills, two fleets, with 
nineteen thousand armed men on board, engaged in a 
sanguinary combat. Over this struggle, where mimicry 
and stern reality were blended, the Emperor presided, 
with Agrippina, clad in a mantle refulgent with gold, at 
his side.’ 

It must be remembered that the gladiatorial games in- 
stituted by the emperors and other high officers of state, 
were not the only contests of this kind. Similar ex- 
hibitions on private account, and on a larger or smaller 
scale, were very frequent in Italy and elsewhere. Among 
the most durable monuments of antiquity are the amphi- 
theatres which are found wherever the Roman rule ex- 
tended. 

The Greeks were at first averse to these exhibitions, 
where the human form was gashed and mangled. But this 
repugnance diminished with familiarity. Josephus tells us 
that, in Judea, Herod Agrippa had 700 pairs contend in one 


1 See the description of Tacitus, Annal., xii. 56. 


218 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


day.! In all the provinces of the empire, these brutal and 
brutalizing spectacles were exhibited. The Latin writers, 
with the exception of Seneca in a single passage, give them 
their approval. Abhorrent to the spirit of Christianity, 
they were denounced by Christian teachers from the outset. 
Constantine was the first to condemn them in an edict. But 
this inhuman diversion continued at Rome until the reign 
of Honorius (404 Α. }».). Telemachus, an Asiatic monk, 
leaped into the arena to separate two combatants, and was 
stoned to death by the people, who were angry at this inte- 
ference with their pleasure. But he was honored as a mar- 
tyr, and the laws of Honorius, prohibiting these contests, 
were obeyed.” 

One may ask how it was possible for men and women to 
enjoy spectacles of agony and death, the bare narrative of 
which excites an emotion of horror. We may be aided in 
some slight degree to comprehend this, by recollecting how 
throngs will gather now to witness a bull-fight or a prize- 
fight; and still more, by the scenes that took place formerly 
in connection with public executions. But Christianity has 
so far modified the sentiments that no modern custom can 
afford more than a faint parallel to the brutality of the am- 
phitheatre. What a ghastly impression is made when we 
find Ovid, at a time when the sexes were not seated apart, 
speaking of this as a fit place for the lover to prosecute his 
suit: he can discuss the programme with his companion, 
say soft things in the intervals between the combats, and 
join her in a wager as to the result of the contest which 
ends in the butchery of one or the other of the combatants.* 
We can account for such a state of things only by the fact 
that the gladiators were considered as condemned or worth- 
iess men, for whose lives nobody cared. Human rights 


LAntig:, xux. (4.0: 2 Theodoret, H. E., v. 26. 
3 Ars Am.i., 164 seq. 


CHARACTERISTIC VICES OF HEATHENISM. 219 


and human equality were the vague theories of a few 
philosophers. International law existed only in its rudi- 
ments. Luxury and vice had dulled the appetite for di- 
versions less terrible and exciting. 


Such was the state of society in the first century. Nor 
was there wanting a consciousness of the decay and ap- 
proaching ruin of all things which men had most valued. 
The noblest men took refuge in Stoicism ; and suicide was 
_ frequent among them. A vein of melancholy runs through 
the histories of Tacitus. Repeatedly he adverts to the 
wrath of the gods against the Roman state, as a fact to be 
taken for granted. He apologizes for the interminable 
catalogue of crimes and sufferings which he is compelled to 
record. “The more I meditate,’ he says, “upon the 
events of ancient and modern times, the more I am im- 
pressed with the capricious uncertainty which mocks the 
calculations of men.”’ He was oppressed by the contem- 
plation of the gloomy drama of human history. It was 
not a period of hope, but of sadness and despair. The 
world seemed to have stopped its motion and to have be- 
gun to dissolve itself into the primitive chaos. An incu- 
rable internal disease had fastened upon the Roman State, 
and what was there beyond it? 


Licentiousness and cruelty, the two characteristic vices 
of ancient society, which produced a brood of unnatural 
sins and crimes, did not prevail, to be sure, in an equal de- 
gree in the different periods of ancient history. Under 
Trajan and the Antonines there was a better state of things 
than existed in the era which we have chiefly considered 


1 Mihi, quanto plura recentium seu yveterum revolvo, tanto magis 
ludibria rerum mortalium cunctis in negotiis observantur. Quippe 
fama, spe, veneratione, potius omnes destinabantur imperio, quam, quem 
futurum principem fortuna in occulto tenebat.’ Annal. iii. 18. 


220 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


in this chapter. When we go back to an earlier period, to 
the age, for example, when Athens was in its glory, there 
is likewise presented a less revolting picture. And yet 
we must join in the verdict of a scholar, not wanting in 
eatholicity of judgment, “that if the inner life had been 
presented to us of that period which in political greatness 
and art is the most brilliant epoch of humanity, we should 
have turned away from the sight with loathing and detes- 
‘tation. The greatest admirer of heathen writers, the man 
endowed with the finest sensibilities for beauty and form, 
would feel at once that there was a great gulf fixed between 
us and them, which no willingness to make allowance for 
the difference of ages and countries would enable us to 
pass.””! This disparity between heathen and Christian 
society, it cannot be denied, is mainly due to the fact that 
under the one the objects of worship were the imperfect 
creatures of human fancy, and worship was itself largely 
sensuous, while under the other the objects of religious 
faith correspond to the true ideal of perfection, and worship 
rises to an unseen world. 


1 Professor Jowett, Epp. of St. Paul, p. 77. 


THE CONDITION OF THE JEWS. 221 


CHAPTER VII. 


THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS CONDITION OF THE JEWS AT 
THE BIRTH OF CHRIST. 


On the eastern borders of the Roman empire, inhabiting 
a narrow strip of territory, dwelt a people who defied every 
attempt to break up their national feeling, and, in spite of a 
subjection to foreign domination, which had lasted for more 
than five hundred years, still confidently believed that they 
were the predestined conquerors and rulers of mankind. 
The germ of this great hope, which had grown into an 
absorbing, passionate expectation, antedated their existence 
asanation. It lay in a divine purpose revealed to their 
progenitor, Abraham, that his posterity should be as the 
stars for multitude, and that from them a blessing should 
go forth to all other nations. Such was the prospect that was 
opened to the soul of the Patriarch, a faithful worshipper of 
the only true God, in the midst of the spreading idolatry. Of 
the Hebrew people, as of no other, was it true that, from 
the beginning of their career, religion was consciously the 
one end and aim of their being. That the true religion 
might both attain to its perfect development, and gather 
all mankind under its sway—this may be said to be the 
idea of their history. Their abode for several centuries in 
Egypt, following upon the nomadic life which they had 
previously led, brought them into contact with what was 
even then an ancient and civilized people. From the 
Egyptians they learned the mechanical arts; but from the 


222 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


seductions of their religion the Hebrews were saved by 
the hostile relations that sprang up in consequence of the 
oppression with which they were treated. Moses, their 
deliverer, stands also at the head of the prophets, the in- 
terpreters of the will of God, who came forward from time 
to time, as the exigencies of an age might require, to give 
expression to whatever was deepest and holiest in the reli- 
gious life of the people, and by impassioned rebuke, exhor- 
tation, and command, to purify their conduct and exalt 
their enthusiasm. 

With the legislation of Moses, the Jewish common- 
wealth began. Now for the first time they became a politi- 
cal community. They were to stand under the special 
protection and guidance of God, who was not, however, a 
national God, in the narrow sense of heathenism, but the 
Supreme Creator and Ruler of the whole earth. Thus 
their religion was distinguished from every other ancient 
faith by being, of necessity, exclusive, and intolerant of 
dissent. They were to be witnesses for God, a nation of 
priests, set apart from other peoples by virtue of this rela- 
tion, and by the unique polity under which they were to 
live. In keeping the divine law, they fulfilled their part, 
and acquired a title to the promises connected with obedi- 
ence. This covenant between them and Jehovah was the 
magna charta of the Hebrew nation. For about 450 
years, after entering Palestine, they lived in a kind of the- 
ocratic state, governed by judges, who arose in different 
places, and from time to time, under the impulse of a 
divine call to exercise the functions of leadership. Anar- 
chy led to the popular demand for a monarchical system. 
Danger from foreign enemies called for a firmer political 
organization ; and to this motive was added the considera- 
tion that while Samuel, the last and most eminent of the 
judges, had grown old, his sons were not worthy to succeed 


THE JEWS UNDER THE MONARCHY. 223 


to his power. Accordingly, in 1099 B. c., Saul was crowned 
king. The Theocracy, however, did not cease with this 
change. Side by side with the kings, stood the prophets 
to utter the divine will to ruler and subject, to curb and 
rebuke, as well as to stimulate and uphold the temporal 
power. Nor did the monarchy operate to quench the 
higher hopes of Israel. 

Under David and Solomon the boundaries of the king- 
dom were carried to the Euphrates and the confines of 
Egypt. This vast extension of power seemed to foretoken 
the realization of the promise. Jerusalem, which had been 
conquered from the Canaanites by David, became, with its 
palace and temple, the centre of sacerdotal and regal splen- 
dor. But not one of the kings was the man demanded by 
the deepest purposes and aspirations that were latent in the 
religion of Jehovah. Hence, the Messianic hope, while it 
acquired a new definiteness through the type and precursor 
which the monarchy furnished, remained unfulfilled.1 More- 
over, the temporal grandeur of the kingdom, with the lux- 
ury and corruption that were incidental to it, menaced 
that pure religious development which was the heaven- 
appointed work of the nation. Solomon built the temple, 
and elevated the priesthood and worship of the Sanctuary. 
He excited, also, among the people a relish for wisdom, of 
which he was venerated as the founder and master, in al} 
subsequent times.” His reign became, in after times, a sym- 
bol of earthly glory and riches. But his magnificence was 
costly, and involved the burdensome taxation of his sub- 
jects. His son, Rehoboam, arrogantly spurned the peti- 
tions for relief which were presented to him by the disaf- 
fected people; and the ten tribes north of Judea, partly for 
this reason, and partly from tribal jealousy and from 9 


1 Ewald, Gesch. d. Volkes Israel, 111. 12. 
2 Ewald, 111, 488, 


224 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


continued attachment to the house of Saul, renounced their 
allegiance. The kingdom was thus divided forever. This 
was in 975 B.c. From this time, monarchy among the 
Hebrews approaches its dissolution. It rose to full vigor 
under the auspices of David ; its era of splendor was the 
reign of Solomon; but its third and final period, though 
much longer than either of the others that preceded it, was 
one of decline. Israel, the northern division, fell a prey to 
Assyrian invasion. Samaria, the capital, was taken by 
Shalmaneser in 722 B. c., and a multitude of Israelites were 
deported from their country. In their room, heathen were 
introduced, and hence the Samaritans, being of mixed de- 
scent, as well as separated from the temple, were ever after 
counted as aliens and foes. Their position could not be 
more completely or concisely expressed than in the words 
of the Evangelist: “For the Jews have no dealings with 
the Samaritans.”! Judea, nearly a century anda half 
later, followed the fate of Israel. In 588 B. c. Jerusalem 
was captured by Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, and 
the principal inhabitants carried off into exile. This ter- 
rible catastrophe did not crush the faith and hope which 
had animated the Jewish heart through all preceding vicis- 
situdes of the national history. Rather was it true that 
just in this era, before and during the Exile, the spirit of 
prophecy rose to its loftiest height. There was a faithful 
body who were inspired with the unconquerable conviction 
that the kingdom of God, now trampled in the dust, was 
imperishable, and that its adversaries would be broken in 
pieces. 

The monarchy had fallen. It had given the people of 
God a name and fame among the nations. It had aided, 
in many ways, in the preservation and development of the 
national religion. Compare the Songs of Deborah with the 


1 John iv. 9, 


THE EXILE AND DELIVERANCE. 225 


Psalms of David.’ But the monarchy embodied an ele- 
ment of force through which the religion could neither 
attain to its perfection in the conceptions and life of the 
people, nor diffuse itself abroad upon the earth. The civil 
unity of the nation was now broken in pieces. Nothing 
was left to them in their helplessness but to fall back upon 
the truths of that religion, and the succor of God. To no 
earthly power could they look for sympathy or help. Thus 
religion assumed its rightful supremacy as the one peculiar 
possession and glory of the people. The prophetic activity 
was left to exert itself with unimpeded power. Hencefor- 
ward, the work of the nation could no longer be limited by 
its own borders. “Israel, after having once been thrown 
into the great stream of universal history, though only asa 
spiritual power, could never again withdraw from the midst 
of all the nations, and build for itself a close and strong 
kingdom similar to the other greater or smaller empires of 
the world.” ? But the religion had not yet ripened into its 
universal form, the prerequisite of its universal diffusion. 
A consciousness of this imperfection was attended with two 
results. First the yearnings of the people reached out with 
a new earnestness towards the Messiah of the future; and, 
secondly, the longing for a return to their own land, and to 
their life as a community there, held possession of their 
minds. 

The fall of Babylon, in 536, brought to them deliverance. 
They had been usually treated more as colonists than cap- 
tives ; but, mingled as they were with the heathen, they 
were subject to strong temptations to compromise or give 
up their faith and observances. It was that part of the 
people which had sternly withstood these enticements, that 
chose to avail themselves of the permission of Cyrus to 


1 Ewald, History, iii. 58. (Engl. transl.) 
Ξ τ y. 36. (Engl. transl.) 


226 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


return to their own land, and rebuild the sacred places. 
Their zeal for the law had been sharpened by the ex- 
periences of the exile. In them the mingled sentiments 
of religion and patriotism burned with intense ardor. 
There was really a sifting of the nation, for the number 
that remained were to those that returned to the old home 
and sanctuary as six to one. In the first caravan were 
42,360, besides servants. Other bodies followed later, 
under Ezra, B. c. 458, and under Nehemiah, Β. ο. 448. 
~The temple rose from its ruins, and the rites for which the 
devout had longed were restored in all their strictness. 

The People of God were now once more a community, 
within the borders of their own land. But they were no 
longer independent. The restoration of the monarchical 
theocracy—the kingdom of David—was out of the ques- 
tion. Their religion had been preserved; to rescue and 
fortify this chief and characteristic possession had neces- 
sarily become the supreme object of pursuit. In reorgan- 
izing society, they fell back upon ancient laws, the primi- 
tive constitution, which formed the covenant with Jehovah, 
for the violation of which, as they deeply felt, these heavy 
penalties had fallen upon them. Everything favored the 
legal and ritualistic spirit Under its influence, prophetic 
activity was repressed. After the Exile, ensued the gov- 
ernment of the Hagiocracy. It availed to fortify the ancient 
faith against the inroads of heathenism. It invested as 
with a thick crust the spiritual life which it sought to pro- 
tect. Yet in the long interval between the Return from 
Babylon and the Consummation through the appearance 
of the Messiah, while the nation was under a succession of 
foreign masters, not only did the body of religious doc- 
trine expand itself, in many points legitimately, but the 
Gospel element, if one may so term it, was rife within the 
bosom of the community, and struggling to liberate itself 


JUDEA UNDER SYRIAN RULE. ᾿ Dat 


from the bondage of the letter and of the priesthood. 
There is a striking resemblance between the ancient 
Church in this period, and the Christian Church under 
the hierarchical organization of the middle ages, when 
the purer principle of Christianity was imprisoned, as 
it were, yet acquiring the strength through which at 
length it burst its bonds. The closing part of this in- 
terval in Jewish history, when the influence of Hellenism 
was most active, is not without points of parallelism with 
the age of the Renaissance. 

The Jews,though restored to their old home, had not 
gained their independence. The chosen pecple, separated 
from the heathen, and receiving their laws directly from 
Jehovah, were still subject to the foreigner. But as long as 
the mild rule of Persia continued, there was less reason to 
complain. Cyrus was regarded as a providential man, raised 
up by Providence for the emancipation of his people.’ Their 
local institutions, and, above all, their religion were left 
untouched. But after the great campaign of Alexander 
(334-323 B. c.), their lot, under the Greek domination, be- 
came a bitter one. The grand effort which he made to 
hellenize the Eastern nations, to diffuse the Greek language, 
customs, and manners, and thus to create a homogeneous 
empire, was carried forward by his successors, the Seleucids, 
who reigned in Syria. Palestine became the prize, and 
frequently became the theatre, of contest between these 
princes and the Ptolemies of Egypt. It fared compara- 
tively well under the Ptolemies, who were patrons of learn- 
ing and commerce. But at length it fell permanently under 
the sway of Syria. The Jews found themselves surrounded 
and invaded by Gentilism. Their little territory was 
bounded on three sides by Greek cities. It seemed as if 
the streams of trade, commerce, conquest would overwhelm 


1 Ts. xliv. 28, xlv. 1. 


228 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


them ; as if the contagion of perpetual intercourse with 
the heathen would infect their religious system to such a 
degree as to destroy its characteristic features. It was a 
new chapter in the long conflict with heathenism, which 
more than once seemed about to sweep away their creed 
and worship, or to sap their foundations. The foreign, 
Greek-speaking Jews, although, in the main, steadfast, in- 
terposed, on the whole, a less firm barrier in the way of 
heathen innovations. In Judea itself, there was a party 
lukewarm in its faith, and disposed to give way to the for- 
eign influence. But these perils rendered the majority of 
the people the more immovable in their resistance, the 
more punctilious and rigid in their observance of the law, 
and the more zealously hostile to the pollutions of hea- 
thenism. The crisis came when Antiochus Epiphanes, 
embittered by his failures in conflict with Egypt, and with 
a despot’s impatience at seeing any obstacle in the way of 
his capricious will, determined to break down the wall of 
separation between the Jews and the rest of his subjects, 
and to exterminate their worship. He so far succeeded 
that, in 168 B.c., he set up an altar of Jupiter—the “ abo- 
mination of desolation”—in the temple, and even com- 
pelled the Jewish priests to immolate swine. Then occurred 
the Maccabean revolt. Mattathias, the father of the As- 
monean family, of priestly descent, dwelling at the town 
of Modin, refused to take part in the idolatry required by 
the king, and, with his five sons, armed with cleavers, cut 
down the apostate Jew at the altar on which he was δὖ- 
tempting to offer idolatrous sacrifice. Then followed a 
heroic contest with the whole power of Syria. “ We fight,” 
said Judas Maccabeus, “ for our lives and our laws.” “It 
is better for us,” he said, “to die in battle than to behold 
the calamities of our people and our sanctuary. Never- 
theless as the will of God is in heaven, so let Him 


THE MACCABEES. 229 


do.”' Judas recovered the temple, but fell in battle, in 160 
B. C., and all was, for the time, lost. Jonathan, his brother, 
took his place. He was seized treacherously, and mur- 
dered, in 143 B.c. Simon was the next champion from this 
family ; and under him, after a long alternation of  tri- 
umph and defeat, the victory was achieved, the Syrian yoke 
was cast off, and the Jews were free. Simon was made 
governor and high-priest, uniting thus in himself civil 
and ecclesiastical jurisdiction; and this power was to 
descend in his family “until a faithful prophet should 
arise.” ? In 135 B.c., Simon was assassinated by his son- 
in-law Ptolemzeus, who failed to profit by his crime. John 
Hyrkanus, the son of Simon, a vigorous prince, reigned un- 
til 105 Β. σ. From this time, civil and foreign wars, occa- 
sioned largely by the misdeeds, or inefficiency, of his de- 
generate descendants, weakened the land. In the year 78 
Β. Ο., by the death of Alexander Janneus, the kingdom 
fell into the hands of his widow, Alexandra, called by the 
Jews, Salome, who made her eldest son, Hyrcan 11., high 
priest. The contest between him, and his brother Aristo- 
bulus 11., which broke out in open war, on the death of 
their mother (69 B.c.), cost the Jews their liberty. 
Hyrcan 11., who had been prevailed on to abdicate, was put 
forward and supported by Antipater, a proselyte and prince 
of Idumea, which Hyrcan 1. had annexed to Judea. Pom- 
pey, who was fresh from the conquest of Asia, gladly in- 
tervened to settle the strife. Judas Maccabeus had entered 
into an alliance with the Romans ;* and the treaty, which 
had been signed by his envoys in the senate house, had 
been renewed with his successors. The subjugation of 
Asia Minor and of Syria could not fail to change the rela- 
tion of the Jewish kingdom to the conquering empire, and 


11 Mace. 111. 21, 59, 60. 2 Mace. xiv. 41. 
3 Josephus, Antiq., xii. 10. 


230 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


to transform allies into subjects. The resistance of Aristo- 
bulus gave occasion for an attack upon Jerusalem. In the 
capture, 12,000 Jews were slain. When the soldiery 
rushed into the temple, the priests went on with the sacri- 
fices which they were offering, and were slaughtered at the 
altars where they served. Pompey and his officers made 
their way into the inner sanctuary, the Holy of Holies, and 
were astonished to find there no image of a divinity." After 
the battle of Pharsalia, Hyrcan 11., the nominal ruler, under 
the general superintendence of the Governor of Syria, to- 
gether with Antipater in whose hands the weak Hyrcanus 
left the reins of authority, went over to the side of Julius 
Cesar. Antipater died in the year 43 B.c.; and three 
years later, by the favor of Mark Antony, with the assent 
of Augustus, Herod, his son, was made king.” It was 
not, however, until three years later, that he overcame the 
opposition of Antigonus, supported by the Parthians, and 
Jerusalem fell into his hands. Antigonus, the son of 
Aristobulus 11. and the last of the Asmonean princes, was 
beheaded. Herod had to quell the resistance instigated by 
the Pharisees, which he succeeded in doing by the most 
rigorous measures ; and the opposition of adherents of An- 
tigonus in Jerusalem he put down, after the Roman method, 
by a proscription, in which forty-five persons from opulent 
and noble families were executed. Besides the formidable 
elements of disaffection within his kingdom, he was endan- 
gered by the enmity of Cleopatra, and maintained his good 
standing with Antony only by surrendering at her demand 
important parts of his dominion. After the battle of 
Actium, he repaired to Rhodes to make his peace with 
Augustus, whom he adroitly contrived to conciliate and 
gratify, and by whom he was confirmed in the enjoyment 
of his kingly authority. On the death of Herod in the 


1 Joseph., Antig. 4, 4. 3 Joseph., Antig. xiv. 14, 4. 


HEROD. 231 


year when Christ was born—that is, 4 B. c.—Augustus, 
contrary to the earnest wishes of the people, who preferred 
to come directly under the Roman authority, allotted the 
kingdom to the three sons of Herod, Judea falling to 
Archelaus. But, ten years after, he was dethroned from 
his office of Tetrarch, and banished to Vienne in Gaul. 
Judea, being annexed to the Province of Syria, was now 
governed by Procurators, Pontius Pilate receiving this 
office in the year 26. 

For upwards of thirty years, in addition to the Roman 
domination, the Jewish people had to endure the tyranny 
of Herod. His physical vigor, his military talents and 
energy, his quick sagacity and adroitness were conspicuous. 
He was not without a predilection for philosophy and his- 
tory, and a love of art. With the wild, ungoverned pas- 
sions which betokened his barbarian extraction, he had a 
shrewdness which taught him to choose the best means for 
the accomplishment of his purposes, and, if occasion re- 
quired, to bend to circumstances. His servility to the 
Romans, upon whose favor his power wholly depended, 
was in contrast with his imperious temper where he had 
less to fear. His whole career shows his ability as a ruler, 
but displays equally his ambition, cruelty, and sensuality. 
Herod had successively ten wives. The second was Mari- 
amne, grand daughter of Hyrcan m1. His jealousy of 
the Asmonean house, and his vindictive temper, led him 
to perpetrate a series of murders in his own family. He 
destroyed the father of his wife ; and then in the year 30 
B.C., when he was going to meet Augustus, and knew not 
how he would fare at the interview, he caused her grand- 
father, the aged Hyrcan 11., to be put to death. Then 
he caused Aristobulus, her youthful brother, to be 
drowned, as if by accident, in the bath; and when called 
to account by Antony, escaped by the free use of mo- 


232 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


ney.’ Then ina fit of jealous passion, he slew Mariamne 


herself, of whom he was ardently fond, and for whom, when 
the deed was done, he poured out frantic lamentations— 


where 
“ Revenge is lost in agony 
And wild remorse to rage succeeding.” ? 


Her mother Alexandra shared her fate. His sons by Mari- 
amne, Alexander and Aristobulus, who had been educated 
at Rome, were the next victims; and, finally, Antipater, 
the son of Doris, his first wife, and one whose plots had 
brought on these tragedies, was himself ordered to execution. 

Herod was a professed adherent of the Jewish religion. 
He rebuilt the old temple of Zerubbabel in a style of mag- 
nificence ; and in order that no unconsecrated hands might 
be employed upon it, the structure was reared by a thou- 
sand priests, clad in white garments, who had been trained 
for the work.* He was careful not to outrage the sensi- 
bilities of the people to such a degree as to rouse them to a 
combined and desperate resistance. But they hated him 
and his government. He was not a Jew by descent, but 
an Idumean proselyte, whose profession of Judaism was a 
matter of policy, and not of conviction. He cringed before 
his Roman superiors, whose yoke rested heavily upon them. 
They saw the taxes which he wrung from them, lavishiy 
expended upon objects identified with heathenism, or given 
to curry favor with his heathen patrons and masters. He 
even made contributions for the support of the Olympian 
games.* He built, at an enormous expense, Ceesarea upon 
the sea-coast, with its harbor, and its breakwater, composed 
of stones of an average length of fifty feet; and he adorned 


1 Joseph., Antiq., xv- 3, 8. 

2 Byron’s Hebrew Melodies: Herod’s “Lament for Mariamne.” Joseph., 
Antig., xv. 9, B. J., i. 22, 5. 

3 Joseph., xy. 11. 5, 6. 4 Thid., xvi. 5, 3. 


THE PHARISEES AND THE SADDUCEES. 233 


this new and rival capital with a temple dedicated to 
Cesar and to Rome, and conspicuous from afar to all 
who approached the coast.’ He went so far as to build an 
amphitheatre in the Holy City itself, and to exhibit within 
it gladiatorial combats. He even erected a theatre for 
dramatic performances.” If his personal character was 
odious to the serious part of the nation, his half-disguised 
encouragement of Gentilism, of the detested ways of the 
heathen, and his maintenance of their usurped rule, were 
to the last extent loathsome. 

The resistance to the flood of Gentile influences from 
every quarter centred in the Pharisees. Six thousand of 
them refused to take an oath of allegiance to Herod on his 
accession, but were put down with a strong hand.* Im- 
mediately after his death, Judas, the Galilean, whose party 
was a fanatical offshoot of Pharisaism, raised a revolt, which 
was crushed by the two legions of Varus, who crucified two 
thousand malcontents, besides capturing Sepphoris, the head- 
quarters of Judas, and selling its inhabitants into slavery.* 
Out of this movement sprang the Zealots, by whom the 
flame of resistance was fanned, until it broke out in the 
last great and fatal conflict with Rome, ending in the cap- 
ture of Jerusalem, and the destruction of the temple, by 
Titus. 

But, independently of various efforts at armed insurrec- 
tion, the Pharisees interposed a continuous moral resistance 
to the agencies at war with the liberty and religion of the 
Jews. ‘They are to be considered in contrast with the Sad- 
ducees, with whom their name is so frequently coupled. 
Neither were sects in the proper sense of the term,’ although 
they are so designated by Josephus, who wished to make 


1 Joseph., Antig., xv. 9, 6. 2) 1014. xv. 8: ale 
3 Joseph., Antig. xvii. 2, 4. 4Tbid., Bed. 11: ἃ: 
5 See Gritz, Geschichte der Juden, iii. 87; Schiirer, p. 425. 


234 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


himself intelligible to the foreigners for whom he was 
writing.! They were parties into which the nation was 
divided. The Pharisees, especially, so far from being a 
sect, were the leaders and authoritative teachers of the na- 
tion. “They sit in Moses’ seat.”? They and their adhe- 
rents comprised a great majority of the people. Pharisaism 
was a thing of gradual development. For its beginning, we 
must go back to the first settlement of returned exiles, and 
to the sharpened zeal for the law, and in particular, for the 
ritual, which they brought with them. Those who set 
their faces against all heathen innovations, and all laxity in 
the observance of the ceremonies prescribed in the law, be- 
gan to be known asa class—the Chasidim, “or the Saints.” * 
The Maccabean revolution gave an increased impetus to 
this movement in the interest of a patriotic and religious 
conservatism. The more eminent and conspicuous repre- 
sentatives of this intense legalism came to be called the 
Pharisees —‘“‘ the separated,” as the word denotes—the 
Puritans. The people looked up to them as guides and 
examples. The Sadducees, it is thought by some, derived 
their name from Zadok, a high-priest in the time of 
David. The name, if thus derived, would signify the 
family and adherents of Zadok. By others it is supposed 
to come from the Hebrew term meaning righteousness, 
and to be a name of opprobrium applied by their adversa- 
ries to them as claiming to be adherents of the Law.° 


The first point of contrast between the Pharisees and 
Sadducees, who emerged into a distinct form and antago- 


1 Joseph., Life, 32; Antiqg., xiii. 5, 9, xvili. 1, 2, B. J., 11. 8,2. He 
styles them “sects in philosophy.” 

7 Mattia αι χ τι" 2. 

5. Ezra wield tox, 11: Neh. ἴχι Ὁ; 28: 

* Ezek., xl. 46. See Ewald, Gesch. d. Volkes Israel, iv. 358, 494. 

5 Derenbourg, Hist. et Géog. de la Palestine, P. 1., p. 77. 


THE PHARISEES AND THE SADDUCEES. 235 


nism to one another in the reign of Hyrcan 1. (+ 105), is 
asocialone. The Sadducees, comparatively few in number, 
were made up of nobles, of priests of high rank.! The 
high-priesthood, and other great offices of the temple, were 
in their hands.’ In the heat of the struggle against Syria, 
the Chasidim, the forerunners of the Pharisaic party, had 
joined hands with the Maccabean leaders. Yet the over- 
scrupulous notions of “the saints” had prevented a cordial 
alliance at all times, even with Judas Maccabeus. Their 
offensive questioning of the priestly descent of Hyrcan had 
produced an open rupture between him and them, which 
their adversaries knew well how to use for their own ad- 
vantage. These were the party of the aristocracy, cold in 
their national feeling, not only averse to fanaticism, but, 
also, practically, if not actively, lending countenance to the 
foreign influence, which, first under the auspices of the 
Greeks, and now of the Romans and of Herod, excited the 
deep apprehensions and stern hostility of their opponents. 
They rested under the well-founded imputation of a want 
of patriotism and of religious earnestness. 

The second point of contrast between these parties was 
in their relations to the law. The Sadducees did not, as 
many have supposed, reject the Old Testament with the 
exception of the books of Moses. But they attributed the 
highest authority, and, perhaps, normal authority alone, to 
these books, They made nothing of the pregnant instruc- 
tions, the germinant truths, and the kindling hopes of pro- 
phetic Judaism. And they stuck to the letter of the law, 
refusing to sanction additions of any sort, even the modifica- 
tions which might be deemed a proper and legitimate de- 
velopment of the Mosaic legislation, and conformed to its 
spirit. Thus, it is remarkable that they were more rigid 
than the Pharisees in imposing the penalties in full mea- 


1 Jos., Antig. xviii. 14. ? Acts v. 17. 


236 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


sure, which the Mosaic laws appointed. There must 
be “an eye for an eye.”' The Pharisees, on the con- 
trary, were bent, to use their own phrase, upon “ build- 
ing a hedge about the law,” by defining its demands with 
reference to every situation and circumstance of life. 
They would shut out heathen contamination by cover- 
ing, as it were, the whole life with a net-work of rules. 
Where the Old Testament statutes were silent, where 
they were capable of a double interpretation, where new 
questions might arise from the altered condition of so- 
ciety, the Pharisees came in with their precise expositions 
and precepts. These were the traditions of the elders, the 
supplementary laws, constituting a copious, unwritten code, 
which was transmitted orally, and which, it was at length 
claimed, emanated from Moses himself.? As high, and 
even higher authority was attributed to this code than 
to the written law itself. One could do nothing, and avoid 
nothing, which was not somehow touched by the law in its 
endless ramifications. Especially were the externals of 
worship, both public and private, the subject of the most 
elaborate and minute definition. 

There was a noble side to this prevalent legalism, re- 
garded as a grand attempt, in the face of adverse influences 
of the most powerful and varied character, to uphold the 
religion of the Old Testament, the religion of Moses and 
the prophets, the revealed faith, against the inroads of idol- 
atry and the corrupting influences of Gentile worship and 
culture. When Pilate caused the garrison of Jerusalem to 
bring in by night the Roman standards, with small images 
of the Emperor upon them, the people flocked to Cesarea in 
a mass, and for five days and nights besought the Procu- 


1 For other examples, see Hausrath, N. T. Zeitgesch., i, 121. 
3 On the transmission of traditions, see Lutterbeck, Die Neutestamentl. 
Lehrbegrife, i. 171. 


THE PHARISEES. 237 


rator to withdraw this abomination from the holy place. 
On the sixth day, when Pilate caused the people to be sur- 
rounded by his soldiers with drawn swords, the multitude’ 
bared their necks, and declared that they preferred to die 


rather than behold the violation of their law. Pilate gave ,~ 


the required order for the removal of the images." This is 
only one of a multitude of examples of a devotion to their 
religion, which led the Jews to brave all terrors, and which 
might at the end, if they had possessed military leaders of 
competent skill, have rendered them invincible to Roman 
arms. Pharisaism had its worthy side, and its good men: 
Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea, Gamaliel were Pharisees.’ 
But, under their auspices, religion was resolved into law— 
a law which, with its numberless and meddlesome injunc- 
tions became a burdensome yoke. Upon the single topic of 
the observance of the Sabbath, there were thirty-nine gen- 
eral rubrics, under each of which were numerous subordinate 
precepts, each with specified exceptions, and all together 
forming of themselves an extensive code. For example, it 
was forbidden to tie and untie knots, but there were certain 
exceptions, and what these were must be stated : for instance, 
a woman might tie the knots requisite for fastening her dress. 
With respect to fasting, lustrations, and the whole rubric of 
ceremonial purity, there was no end to the commandments 
which every pious Jew was required by the Pharisees rigidly 
to obey. Inward piety was well-nigh smothered under the 
vast weight of ritual practices, often mechanical in their 
nature, and performed from a blind subservience to a 
statutory requirement. Hence formalism belonged to the 
essence of the Pharisaic religion. Hypocrisy could not 


1 The insurgents under the Maccabees at first refused to resist their 
enemies on the Sabbath: 1 Maccabees ii. 32 seq. Plutarch refers to 
this incident as illustrative of the folly of superstition. De Superstit. 8. 

2 For exaggerated praise of the Pharisees, see Gratz, 111, 76. 


238 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


fail to arise and spread, under such a system. The pride 
of the ascetic, the vanity that craves the applause paid by 
the simple to a grade of devotion above the ordinary level, 
a hollow, feigned sanctity mixed with a hard spirit of self- 
seeking, were among the disgusting fruits of Pharisaism. 
They made clean the outside of the cup and platter; they 
devoured widows’ houses and for a pretense made long 
prayers,—these were among the characteristic sins of the 
Pharisaic party.’ With their broad phylacteries—parch- 
ments bound upon the forehead and arm, with texts from 
the Bible inscribed upon them,—reciting their prayers at 
the corners of the streets, and giving alms to the poor 
with ostentatious publicity, they stand out in bold relief 
upon the pages of the New Testament. Their leyal- 
ism carried them into a labyrinth of casuistry ; for they 
undertook to distinguish between what was allowed 
and what was forbidden in every act and situation of 
life. When the selfish desire of personal aggrandize- 
ment and comfort got the ascendency, this casuistry was 
converted into an instrument for evading moral obligations, 
and for committing iniquity under the apparent sanction 
of law. Pharisaism, like Jesuitism, is a word of evil 
sound, not because these parties had no good men among 
them, but because prevailing tendencies stamped upon each 
ineffaceable traits of ignominy. 

In their theological dogmas, the Pharisees and Saddu- 
cees were widely at variance. Josephus, seeking to con- 
nect familiar Greek notions with his description of Jewish 
parties, says that the Pharisees believed in fate without 
wholly rejecting free-will, while the doctrine of fate was 
wholly denied by the Sadducees.? Fate here stands for 


1 Matt. xxiii, 25 (Luke xi. 39), Matt. xxiii. 14, (Mark xii. 40; 
Luke xx. 47). 
4 Joseph., Antiq., xiii. 5, 9, xviii. 1, 3, B. J., ii. 8, 14. 


THE ESSENES. 239 


the doctrine of divine Providence, which the Pharisees ac- 
cepted, but did not press to the extreme of denying free 
agency and accountableness. Using a term of later origin, 
we may call the Sadducees Pelagians. The Pharisees be- 
lieved in the immortality of the soul, the resurrection of 
the body in the case of the righteous, and a future state of 
eternal rewards and punishments. They believed, also, in 
the agency of demons and angels. The Sadducees disbe- 
lieved in these doctrines, and were materialists, holding 
that the soul expires with the body. * 

A third Jewish party is described by Josephus, and no- 
ticed by other writers, the Essenes. The origin of the 
name is uncertain. Ewald derives it from a word meaning 
“the pious ;” Jost froma term signifying “ the select ones.” 
Other but less probable etymologies have been proposed. 
They are first mentioned by Josephus in connection with the 
account of Jonathan Maccabeus (150 8. ο.).7 Numbering 
about four thousand, and dwelling occasionally with others 
in towns, but chiefly in village communities in secluded 
valleys lying eastward of Jerusalem and towards the Dead 
Sea, they were a body of mystics and ascetics. They lived 
in ccenobitic houses, under superintendents, to whom they 
paid implicit obedience; admitted new members to their 
ranks not until after a novitiate of several years ; had a com- 
munity of goods, sat at a common table, combined exer- 
cises of devotion with manual industry, and in the sys- 
tematic ordering of their whole life, as well as in many 
particular customs, strongly resembled monastic establish- 
ments in other countries and ages. Their principal work 


1 Joseph., B. J., ii. 8,14; Matt. xxii. 23; Acts xxiii. 8. The evi- 
dence contradicts Gritz, who says (iii. 79) that while the Sadducees 
rejected rewards and punishments after death, they did not directly deny 
a future life. 


2 Antiq., xiii. 5. 10. 


240 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


was farming; they had among them artisans also, but 
abjured trade and commerce. Simple in their habits, they 
set a high value upon quietness of spirit and the govern- 
ment of the passions. ‘They discarded slavery and oaths, 
were sticklers for ceremonial purity, were accustomed to 
bathe in cold water before meals, and frequently on other 
occasions—even if one of them touched a companion of an 
inferior degree or class,—preferred white linen clothing, the 
apparel of priests, lived in celibacy generally, if not alto- 
gether,’ probably abstained from meat and wine, and sent 
gifts to the temple, but offered no sacrifices. According to 
Josephus, they believed in fate; that is, in unconditional 
Providence. They reverenced the law, and the Scriptures 
which, like other Jews, they read and expounded in wor- 
ship; although it is difficult to tell how they reconciled 
their omission of sacrifices with the Scriptural requirements. 
They had priests of their own, independent of the Levitical 
priesthood. They were quite rigid in observing the Sab- 
bath and they punished blasphemy with death. They be- 
lieved in the immortality of the soul, but not in the continu- 
ance or resurrection of the body. Such, at least, is the re- 
presentation of Josephus. Good souls, they held, have a 
peaceful life, beyond the ocean, where there is neither rain, 
snow, nor heat. Evil souls are banished to a cold and 
dark corner where they suffer unspeakable torments. The 
Essenes believed that the spirit of prophecy continued 
among them, and individuals became conspicuons for their 
gift of prophetic powers. They were honored as sooth- 

1 Josephus (B. J. ii. 8, 13,) describes a class of Essenes who marry. 
Philo (opp. ed. Mangey, ii. 633, 634) says that some of the Essenes marry. 
So Pliny (Nat. Hist. v.17), who says that they are recruited by those 
who fly to them from the tempest of fortune and the miseries of life. 
Compare Schiirer, N. T. Zeitgesch., Ὁ. 607. The fact is, probably, 


that in the stricter colonies women were not admitted. See Hausrath, 
i. 137. 


THE ESSENES. 241 


sayers, or fortune-tellers. Besides the dualism that crops 
out in several features of Essenism, we find among them 
the custom of invoking the sun at the dawn of day,—pos- 
sibly as representing the effulgence of God. Their principal 
non-Judaic peculiarities were aversion to marriage, absti- 
nence from sacrifices, and the homage paid to the sun. 
There has been much speculation as to the origin of these 
features of Essenism, which are so at variance with Hebrew 
feeling, and with Old Testament law, which in various 
other points was so strictly observed. It is probable that 
some of the peculiarities were due to an oriental influence 
proceeding from the Medo-Persian, or Zoroastrian religion. 
The theory of a Buddhistic influence upon them is im- 
probable. Some writers, including Zeller, find traces of a 
Pythagorean influence, through the Greeks ;! but this view, 
to say the least, is doubtful. With strong points of re- 
semblance to Pharisaism, they differed in their dualistic 
tendency, and in discarding sacrifices. Ewald considers 
that they, like the Pharisees, sprang from the Chasidim— 
the party, in the Maccabean times, conspicuous for their 
zeal for purity.” Thus, if not a branch of the Pharisaic 
movement, both grew from the same root. The conscience 
of the people, says Ewald, withdrew, as it were, into 
the wilderness to escape from contact with pollution and 
wickedness. The Essenes were noted for their kindness to 
the poor and the sick. They were supposed to be familiar 
with the healing virtues of plants. In later times, they 
were admired by the heathen, by Pliny, for example, more 
than any other Jews. In the age when Christ appeared, 
they stood aloof from the current of events, and exerted no 
perceptible influence upon public affairs. This accounts 
for the fact that they are not mentioned in the New Testa- 
ment. ‘There is no reason to suppose that John the Bap- 


1 Phil. d, Griechen, iii. 589 seq. ? Gesch., iii, 483 seq. 
16 


242 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


tist was allied to them;' and certain outward features of 


resemblance between Essenism and the teaching of Jesus 
are connected with the strongest points of dissimilarity and 
opposition. 

In close conjunction with the Pharisees, the Scribes are 
often mentioned in the New Testament. They were, most 
if not all of them, Pharisees, and by their special agency 
the Pharisees aimed to secure the absolute dominion of the 
law over the entire life of the people. The Scribes are 
called lawyers, and doctors of the law. It was during and 
immediately after the exile that the law became a subject 
of doctrinal study and comment; and then it was that 
the Scribes began to come forward into prominence. They 
formed an organized class of interpreters of the law, recog- 
nized as such by the priests and the people. It was a part 
of their duty to transcribe the Scriptures, and to furnish 
accurate copies at any time, as they might be wanted 
for the synagogues. There were three offices of high mo- 
ment which they fulfilled. First, they sat in the great 
Sanhedrim at Jerusalem, and their assistance was likewise 
indispensable in the minor courts scattered over the country. 
Then in the synagogues, they generally, if not uniformly, 
expounded the portions of Scripture that were read. And, 
in schools, they taught the Jaw to young men who assem- 
bled in all parts of the land to receive this instruction, and 
to be themselves trained for the office of teachers of the 
people. The Rabbi gathered his pupils about him, both he 
and they being seated. The method of teaching was by 
colloquy and discussion between instructor and pupil. The 
pupil was required to store up in memory the expositions 
of his master. There are no greater feats of memory on rec- 
ord than those which are involved in the oral transmission 


1 Cf. Keim, Gesch. Jesu, i. 484. 


THE SYNAGOGUES. 248 


of the vast amount of matter which entered into the Talmu- 
dic literature. To the Scribes belonged the right to “ bind 
and loose;” that is, the power to expand and apply the law 
—a kind of legislative function. When the pupil became 
qualified to teach, he took his seat at the side of the Rabbi ; 
but before he could conduct a school for himself he must 
go through a form of ordination in which, as a part of the 
ceremony, he was presented by the Rabbi with a key, to 
signify that he was now empowered to expound the word 
for himself.' The Rabbis taught without pay. They were 
revered, and saluted with reverence; the honor felt for the 
law was shared by its learned interpreters.’ As the know- 
ledge of the law was the whole erudition of the Hebrew, 
men might enter upon this study from any occupation, and 
at any age. There was nothing anomalous in the calling 
of Matthew from the receipt of customs, and Simon and 
Andrew from their nets.’ 


The great schools for the nation at large were the syna- 
gogues, which arose soon after the exile, and were found in 
every place of any consideration throughout Palestine. 
There were 480 in Jerusalem alone. It is probable that 
the smallest place had at least one synagogue. In these 
edifices, plain in their structure, of a rectangular form, the 
ark containing the law and other Scriptures was kept ; 
and here the people, seated according to age, with the 
sexes apart, were assembled every Sabbath, and, also, on 
two other days of the week—market-days,—the service on 
these last occasions being briefer. The synagogue was 
under the charge of “elders,” whose president, if such 
an officer existed, was only primus inter pares. (Mark v. 
22; Acts xiii. 15, xviii. 8,17.) In truth, either of the 


! This gives occasion for the language of Jesus, Matt. xvi. 19. 
2 Matt. xxiii. 7. 3 See Hausrath, i. p. 78. 


244 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Elders might be termed a “ Ruler.”' There was a “min- 
ister,” ? cr servant, who performed such duties as that of 
taking the roll from the hands of the Rabbi. There were 
officers for collecting and distributing alms. An offending 
member might be cast out, or cut off, from the synagogue. 
There was a person appointed by the congregation, and 
representing them, who read prayers, to which the people 
responded “ Amen ;” but he was not, it would seem, a 
permanent officer. The Hebrew had given place to the 
Aramaic dialect, so that the law and the prophets, after 
being read, in select portions, in the original, were inter- 
preted. The reading was attended by an exposition. The 
order of the service was as follows: it opened with prayer, 
and the reciting of selected portions of the Thorah, or 
Law, in which were contained in brief the great articles of 
Faith. Then followed the set forms of Prayer, some of 
which have probably survived to the present time in Jewish 
worship. Then came the regular reading of the Law and 
Prophets, with the interpretation and discourse that at- 
tended it; the whole concluding with prayer or benedic- 
tion. The teaching and learning of the law was the 
prime object of the service. It was mainly by the agency 
of the synagogue that the Jews were kept familiar with 
the law. The whole Pentateuch was so divided as to be 
read in a cycle of one, or of three, years. The reader, who 
might be any member of the congregation, stood ; but 
whoever gave the sermon, in connection with it, sat. The 
discussions in and about the synagogues at the close of the 
service were earnest and animated. While other nations 
were immersed in worldly concerns, in trade and com- 
merce, or in the hot pursuit of power or sensual plea- 
sure, it is surely an interesting spectacle to behold this 


1 See Prof. Lightfoot, Philippians, p. 205 n. 1, 
2 ὑπηρετῆς, Luke iv. 20. 


THE SANHEDRIM. 245 


one people, from the oldest to the youngest, absorbed in 
this work of investigating the law and imprinting it upon 
their memories. 

The Great Council—the Supreme Court—of the nation 
was the Sanhedrim at Jerusalem. It consisted of seventy- 
one members, who were priests, elders, or men of age and re- 
puted wisdom, and scribes, over whom usually presided the 
high-priest. They met after the morning sacrifice, common- 
ly in an apartment contiguous to the temple. They sat in a 
semi-circle, with the President in the centre, behind whom, 
and facing the members, on rows of benches, were the pu- 
pils of the Rabbis, who were present to listen to the de- 
bates, and witness the proceedings.’ The great Sanhedrim 
was a judicial body, taking cognizance of all questions re- 
lating to the theocratical law; for example, marriages, 
divorces, the forms of contracts, orthodoxy of opinion, and 
infractions of the Mosaic statutes, of every kind, as well as 
of the common law embodied in traditions. The Romans 
took away from this tribunal the power of inflicting capital 
punishment. Its jurisdiction stretched over the whole land. 
We find Herod, in the early part of his career, summoned 
before the Sanhedrim for executing a brigand in Galilee, 
without its permission. Below this principal Senate, there 
existed in every considerable town, a local court, composed, 
in part at least, of Levites, and at which the Scribes as- 
sisted—the judges being seven in number. Before this 
minor tribunal all ordinary cases were brought. Only 
cases where the interpretation of the law might be doubt- 
ful were relegated to the Sanhedrim at Jerusalem, the court 
of appeals. The sessions of these local courts were held in 
the synagogues. Their sentences were carried out, if prac- 
ticable, on the spot. Thirty-nine stripes were laid upon 


‘ The High-Priest generally presided. Joseph., Antig,, xx., ix. 1; 
Acts iv. 23. 


246 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the offender, one being subtracted from forty, in order that 
this legal limit might not, through an accident in counting, 
be exceeded. ' 

The Rabbis were not perfectly agreed in their teaching. 
Schools of opinion arose, differing from one another on a 
variety of points, mostly pertaining to the ritual. Of these 
the most famous were the parties of Hillel and of Scham- 
mai, the former of whom was characterized by a more lib- 
eral, and the latter by a rigorous construction of the Judaic 
statutes. 

Of the current Jewish theology, the tenets that consti- 
tute orthodoxy, we have now to speak. The canon of the 
Old Testament was of gradual formation. The first and 
second divisions, the Law and the Prophets, were first 
closed, and afterwards the third division, called “the 
Psalms,” was made up. From the statement of Josephus, 
coupled with the testimony of Origen and Jerome, there is 
scarcely any room to doubt that the authoritative canon 
among the Jews in the time of Christ coincided with our 
present canon of the Old Testament. The apocryphal 
books, which were connected with the Septuagint transla- 
tion, either written in Greek, or whose Hebrew originals 
were wanting, were not recognized by the Palestinian 
Jews. By the side of the canonical books, whose inspiration 
and normal authority were admitted, the Rabbis placed 
tradition as a collateral source of religious knowledge. 
The fundamental principles of Mosaic and prophetic Juda- 
ism were maintained. The gods of the heathen were re- 
garded from two points of view; now as_ nothing, as 
wholly creations of fancy, and now as having a real being 
but as inferior to Jehovah, and unable to withstand His 
power. The doctrine of angels, both good and eyil, 


1 Matt. x. 17; 2 Cor. xi. 24. 


THE JEWISH THEOLOGY. 247 


forms a conspicuous feature of the later Jewish theology. ὦ 
The good angels were conceived of as a host, as divided 
into orders and ranks, the principal angelic beings having, 
each of them, names. They were the agents of Provi- 
dence in the government of the world; by them the law 
was given on Mount Sinai. They were the messengers 
of God; they exercised a guardianship over the right- 
eous. Yet they were not objects of religious worship, or 
invogation. They filled up the void, as it were, between 
Jehévah and the world, but they diverted to themselves 
none of the homage that belonged to Him. The doctrine 
of evil angels, or demons, and their mischievous agency, 
was equally prominent. Demoniacal possessions, and cere- 
monies of exorcism, were phenomena of daily occurrence. 
It may be granted that the current Jewish doctrine of 
angels and Satanic beings was stimulated in its develop- 
ment by the influence of the Zoroastrian creed, with which 
the Jews came in contact during the exile ; yet the essen- 
tial elements of this doctrine are of an earlier date, and 
find their warrant within the circle of their own revela- . 
tion. All dualistic ideas which made sin, and the con- 
tinuance of sin, a part of the necessary order of things, and 
shut out the personal agency of the creature, were ex- 
cluded. “In theory, and in the minds of really pious 
men, monotheism remained inviolate; God’s direction of all 
things was not limited by the operations of the wicked 
spirits; therefore they were always subject to Him.” ? 
The problem of physical evil, and especially that aspect 
of the problem which deals with the sufferings endured by 
the righteous, agitated the Jewish mind, but found no com- 
plete solution. The feeling that a conspicuous sufferer must 
be a flagrant transgressor, that peculiar calamities imply 


'See Gfrorer, Das Jahrhundert des Heuls, i. 352-424, 
* Kuenen, the Religion of Israel, iii. 41. 


248 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


peculiar guilt, if not in him, at least in a parent, was pre- 
valent. Yet the Jews were not unfamiliar with the idea 
that even the good may be objects of divine chastisement. 
With reference to the future life, the prevailing Old Testa- 
ment representation of Sheol, or the underworld, the abode 
of the dead, is hardly less sombre than the heathen con- 
ception of Hades. The language in Job on this topic is as 
gloomy as that of Homer. Sheol is an abode of darkness, 
of feeble life, if there be life there at all. As we advance 
in the Old Testament, we meet with brighter views. This 
is the case in some of the Psalms. The passage in Job, be- 
ginning, “I know that my Redeemer liveth,” is of too 
doubtful reference to be placed in this category. At the 
time of the birth of Jesus, the Jews, with the exception of 
the Sadducees, universally believed in the immortality of 
the soul. This article of faith was —if we except the Ksse- 
nes, and the adherents of the Alexandrian Jewish philoso- 
phy of Philo—indissolubly connected in their minds with 
the belief in the resurrection of the body. Josephus attri- 
butes to the Pharisees the belief in the resurrection of the 
righteous only. But in the book of Daniel, which was a 
part of the authoritative canon, and contributed much to 
shape the prevailing conceptions on these topics, the resur- 
rection of both the good and the evil is unambiguously 
declared.’ On subordinate points connected with the doc- 
trine of resurrection, however, there were wide diversities 
of opinion. 

There was one great expectation common to all earnest 
Jews, the expectation of the Messiah. The Old Testament 
religion was prophetic in its whole nature. The guides of 
the Hebrew people were ever pointing to the future. 
There, and not in the past, lay the golden age. The Jew 


1 Daniel xii. 2. 


THE MESSIANIC HOPE. 249 


might revert with pride to the victories of David, and the 
splendor of Solomon, but these vanished glories only served 
to remind him of the lofty destiny in store for his nation, 
and to inspire his imagination to picture the day when the 
ideal of the kingdom should be realized, and the whole 
earth be submissive to the monarch upon Zion. An ex- 
pectation which was latent in the very nature of the theo- 
cratic kingdom, and which found utterance, in a form more 
or less vague, in the early Scriptures, more and more as- 
sumed a concrete expression ; and the hopes of all patriotic 
and devout Jews centred upon a personage who was to ap- 
pear upon the earth, and take in his hands the sceptre of 
universal dominion. The particular form which this hope 
took, might vary with the changing condition of the peo- 
ple, and the sort of calamities that weighed upon them. 
The imagery under which the Messianic era was depicted, 
or shadowed forth, might vary with the point of view of 
the writer, and might be cast in a mould corresponding to 
the limitations of his position. During the Maccabean 
age, when the struggle for liberty filled the nation with en- 
thusiasm, and when another family than that of David was 
leading it forward to victory, it was natural that the Mes- 
sianic hope should slumber. Yet it was never extinguished : 
it was like a fire under the ashes. The first book of Mac- 
cabees contains no distinctly Messianic prediction ; yet it 
refers to the trustworthy prophet who is to arise, and to 
supersede the Asmonean family. The old expectation, in 
certain grand outlines, was still a tenant of the Jewish 
mind. Whether the book of Daniel is a product of the 
Maccabean era, or has an earlier date, is immaterial as con- 
cerns the present point. It is enough that the prediction 
of the Messianic kingdom which it contained, was familiar 
to the Jews, and one upon which they rested. After a 
description of the four kingdoms, the last of which, the 


250 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Roman, “as iron, breaketh in pieces and subdueth all 
things,’ the writer says, that in the days of these kings 
shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall 
never be destroyed.’ 

In the Apocryphal books, the Asswmptio Mosis, and the 
Book of the Jubilees, which were written about the begin- 
ning of the Christian era, the Messianic predictions are 
prominent. In the Sibylline Books, the Book of Enoch, 
(near the end of the second century, B. c.), and the Psalter 
of Solomon (not far from 60 B. c.), the Messiah is per- 
sonal. In the Book of Enoch, he is designated as the Son 
of Man, by which one individual is meant, whatever ques- 
tion may be raised as to the primary sense of this phrase 
in the Book of Daniel. The New Testament, were there 
no other source of knowledge on the subject, shows how 
deeply and widely the yearning for the Messiah had taken 
hold of the hearts of the people. The calamities of the 
Herodian age, the double yoke under which the nation 
groaned, intensified the longing for the Deliverer, which 
assumed a form’ varying with the temper and spirit of 
those who cherished it. 

There are certain features of the Messianic expectation 
cherished at that time by the Jews, which may here be set 
down. The Messiah was to establish his kingdom in a 
time of general distress and calamity. Nature herself was 
to bear witness, by miraculous, terrible phenomena, such as 
the hiding of the sun and moon in darkness, and the 
brandishing of swords in the sky, to the impending crisis. 
The Son of Man, the title given to the Messiah in the 
Book of Enoch, and derived from the Book of Daniel, was 
to be preceded by the reappearance of the stern and sol- 
emn prophet, Elijah, upon the earth. Then the Messiah 


1 Daniel ii. 44. 


THE MESSIANIC HOPE. 251 


Himself, the Anointed One, endued with special gifts and 
powers from God, would arise. The heathen powers 
would unite in a common onset upon Him, but would be 
crushed by His power. Jerusalem would be renovated 
and adorned with beauty; the Diaspora, the Jews who 
were abroad, would be brought back; and a glorious king- 
dom, having its centre and capital in Palestine, but embra- 
cing under it all mankind, would be erected. It was to be 
a time of joy and plenty, an era, also, of holiness and peace. 
In this form, according to many, the kingdom was to con- 
tinue forever. But it was considered by many to be of 
limited duration, and to be introductory to a great change 
—a renewal of the heavens and the earth, which the Mes- 
sianic kingdom was to usher in. Thus a distinction was 
made between “ this world” (6 αἰὼν οὗτος) and “ the world 
to come.” By some the great revolution was expected to take 
place at the very commencement of the Messianic reign ; 
others put it later as the ultimate issue. At this point, the 
general resurrection was to occur, the last judgment, and 
the eternal award of happiness or misery. Prior to the 
general judgment, the abode of the departed was in Hades, 
the righteous being in Paradise, but separated from the 
wicked, who suffered torments, the prelude of the final pen- 
alty to follow the ultimate verdict of the Judge. 

As to the person of the Messiah, the Jews after the 
Christian era considered that he was to be a mere man.! 
In the times that immediately preceded the birth of Jesus, 
it is certain that pre-existence was frequently ascribed to 
the Christ. This is clear from the apocryphal Book of 
Enoch, and the Fourth Book of Ezra. He was chosen, 
and hidden with God, before the world was made.? His 
glory is from everlasting to everlasting. The pre-existence 
and supernatural character of the Messiah were involved 


1 Justin, Dial. c. Trypho, ec. 49. 2 Enoch, 48. 6. 


252 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


in the accepted interpretation of the Book of Daniel. 
There is ground to conclude that, in the period referred to, 
there was a widely diffused conception of the Messiah as 
already existing, withdrawn from sight, in the heavens, 
and destined to appear visibly as man, endowed with su- 
pernatural gifts and qualities, a Ruler of spotless right- 
eousness. * 

The Talmudic writings admit the conception of suffer- 
ings as falling to the lot of the Messiah, and apply to him 
predictions of this character in the Prophets. But within 
the covers of the New Testament, there is no trace of any 
such expectation among the contemporaries of Jesus.” Nor 
do the other writings of that period afford any proof that 
such an idea was cherished.* The galling yoke of heathen 
rule to which the Jews were subject, the wide-spread spirit 
of legalism, and their moral condition in general, led them 
to yearn for a political Messiah. They fastened upon the 
prophetic imagery which fell in with their predilection, 
construed it as a literal description, and not as a poetic 
anticipation, and they passed by everything else of a differ- 
ent purport. Even the humble, and those who aspired 
after emancipation from sin, could not divest their minds 
of the idea that the Messiah was, literally speaking, to sit 
on the throne of David. John the Baptist, in the prison 
in which he had been immured by Herod Antipas, was 
perplexed by the fact that Jesus took a course so dissonant 
from the universal expectation, from which he appears not 
to have been wholly free. He sent his disciples with the 
inquiry: ‘Art thou he that should come, or look we for 
another ?” 4 


* See Ewald, Geschichte, v. 68 seq. 

2 John i. 29 is a possible exception to this remark. See below, p. 429. 
5 See Schiirer, p. 597 seq. 

* Matt. xi. 3; Luke vii. 19, 20. See below, p. 480. 


ALEXANDRIAN JUDAISM. Zoe 


We must not forget that there was a Judaism out of 
Palestine, which, if it affected the currents of Gentile 
thought, might also in turn be tinctured by them. It was 
at Alexandria, under the peculiar influences that belonged 
to that great meeting-place of the nations, that Jewisk 
thought underwent the most serious modifications. There 
the Septuagint version was framed, the Bible of Greek- 
speaking Christians as well as Jews, down to the end of 
the first age of Christianity. There the canon took up 
those books, only one of which, Ecclesiasticus, is known to 
have been written in Hebrew, which are now commonly 
known under the name of Apocrypha, and which the Pa- 
lestinian canon excluded. To commend the Alexandrian 
theology to the Jews of Palestine, “the Wisdom of Solo- 
mon” was written; just as the Book just named, “the Son 
of Sirach,” sought to recommend the Palestinian doctrine 
to the Jews of Alexandria. ' 

Philo, the principal teacher of the Jewish philosophy 
that sprang up at Alexandria, was an old man in the year 
40, when he headed a deputation of Jews to the Emperor 
Caligula. His birth must have occurred, therefore, not far 
from 20 B.c. His system is an amalgamation of Greek 
philosophy with the Old Testament theology ; a combina- 
tion of Plato and Moses, the tenets of whom he considered 
to be, in many points, identical.” The Greek sages, he 
held, were borrowers from the Hebrew teaching. This 
agreement he effected by the flexible method of allegorical 
interpretation, his theory being that an occult sense, open 
to the discerning, underlies the literal and historical mean- 
ing of the Scriptures, and is to be accepted in connection 


1 See Stanley, Hist. of the Jewish Ch., iii. 296. 

2 For the literature upon Philo, see Schirer, p. 619, Ueberweg, Hist. of 
Phil. i. 225, Dorner, Gesch. d. Lehre v. d. Person Christi, i. 22, Lipsius, 
Art., Alexandr. Religionsphil.; in Schenkel’s Bibel-Lexicon. 


254 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


with it. Philo, like Plato, held that matter in its chaotic 
form is eternal, and that creation impresses upon it the pre- 
existing ideas, the patterns before the divine mind, through 
which the formless stuff of the world is turned into a 
cosmos. God is far above all contact with the world; He is 
the ineffable One, whose very attributes are an anthropo- 
morphic conception. Between God Himself and the world, 
and intermediate between them, are the Powers, the in- 
struments of divine agency and communication with the 
creation. Above them, and embracing them in some way, 
is the Logos, first immanent in God as the divine reason, 
and then emerging into emanent existence; in whom is the 
plan of the world, and through whom that plan is actual- 
ized in the cosmos. The Logos is the mediator between 
the absolute Deity, and created existences, bridging over 
this otherwise impassable gulf. He is the Son of God, the 
Archangel, the Paraclete.' The body perishes forever, but 
the soul is immortal. A vein of dualism, caught from the 
Greek schools, runs through the system of Philo, and 
taints his ethical doctrine. He shares only in a vague and 
general way in the Messianic expectation of his countrymen. 
The heathen, he thinks, will eventually be struck with 
shame at having presumed to exercise government over 
the Hebrews, their superiors in wisdom. The acme of de- 
votional attainment is when the soul, in a kind of ecstasy 
holds communion with the Supreme Essence, without the 
mediating intervention of the Logos. Those gifted with 
this intuition, and rising to this exalted fellowship, are 
“the children of the father.” Philo has no thought of 
an incarnation of the Logos. The Messiah is to be a 


1 It is a controverted point whether the Logos of Philo is a personifi- 
cation, or a person. The latter view is held by Dihne, Gfrérer, Se- 
misch, Liicke, Ritter, and others. The reasons against 1t are given by 
Dorner, 1., 22 n, 12, and by Lipsius, in the Article referred to above. 


GALILEE: SAMARIA: JUDEA. 255 


human personage. It should be observed that notwith- 
standing the Platonic influence, Philo found a point of con- 
nection and a foundation for his speculations relative to the 
Logos, in the bold and striking personifications of Wisdom 
in the books of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, and in the Son 
of Sirach—personifications which approach the character 
of actual personality. The ideas of the Philonic school 
were widely diffused. Doubtless they were known in 
Judea, but they would be regarded with no favor by the 
austere guides of the people; nor is it possible that they 
could have penetrated to Nazareth, or within the humble 
circle of disciples which Jesus gathered about Him. 


From the pages of Josephus and from the New Testa- 
ment, one may derive a vivid picture of Palestine in the days 
of Jesus. Galilee, on the north, where His childhood and 
youth were passed, and the scene of a great part of His 
public labors, was a fertile and beautiful region. Espe- 
cially was the lower part, lying westward of the lake, 
famed for its beauty, and for the rich variety of fruits 
and flowers that grew upon its soil. Josephus, in his au- 
tobiography, states that Galilee contained two hundred and 
forty cities and villages; and, in his History of the Jewish 
War, he says that every village contained at least fifteen 
thousand people." Making all proper subtraction from this 
exaggerated estimate, we yet know that over this district 
was spread a dense, busy population. Somewhat less rigid 
than their orthodox brethren and the magnates of the 
nation at Judea, they were spoken of by the latter slight- 
ingly. Their intercourse with the heathen, partly in con- 
sequence of the fact that the great road for caravans be- 
tween Damascus and Ptolemais passed through their 
land, exposed them to censure and suspicion. But the 


1 Vita, 45; 8. σ. III. iii. 2. 


256 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Galileans were ardent patriots; and their indomitable 
valor is lauded by Josephus. 

Between Galilee and Jerusalem, unless the traveller took 
a circuitous route, was hated Samaria. Its inhabitants, 
denied the privilege of taking part in the rebuilding of the 
temple and in the national worship, after the Babylonian 
exile, did all that they could to frustrate the exertions of 
the Judean colonists. At length they erected on Mount 
Gerizim a temple of their own, and Manasseh, a Jewish 
priest, took charge of the services. This inflamed still 
more the mutual hostility of the neighboring peoples. 
“There be two manner of nations,” says the Son of 
Sirach, “which my heart abhorreth ; and the third is no 
nation: they that sit upon the mountain of Samaria [ Mt. 
Seir], and they that dwell among the Philistines, and that 
foolish people that dwell in Sichem.”* At length Hyr- 
canus razed the temple to the ground. The Samaritans 
still held to the law, and to the books of the Pentateuch, 
and looked for a Messiah who should be on their side, as it 
were, and confer honor on the mountain where they wor- 
shipped. They gave their sympathy, first, to the Syrian 
oppressors of Judea, and then to the Romans, whose sub- 
jugation of their Southern neighbors they beheld with 
pleasure. 

The strong-hold of the Jewish nation was in Judea itself. 
There was the seat of theocratical authority. There was 
the sanctuary to which all pious Jews, from Rome to 
Babylon, sent up their gifts, and whither they streamed in 
countless multitudes to the great festivals. 

No one can read Josephus without being profoundly im- 
pressed with the distracted condition of society, the con- 
fusion and distress, the passion and crime, that darkened 
the whole land of the Jews in the closing period of Herod’s 


1 Son of Sirach, i. 25, 26. 


SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE JEWS. 257 


reign. The people were held down by the overmastering 
strength of the Romans, and by the grim fortresses which 
the tyrant had erected in different places, to keep the dis- 
contented populace in subjection. When we turn from 
this troubled scene to the evangelical narratives, it is like 
beholding a star in the darkest night. 


17 


258 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


THE FIRST EVANGELICAL RECORDS: THE GOSPELS OF MARK 
AND MATTHEW. 


ΤΥ is an interesting question whether the Apostle Paul 
made use of written memorials of the life of Jesus, either 
in the form of a record of events, or of discourses. That 
he would need and desire records of this character, is in 
the highest degree probable. He wrote the First Epistle 
to the Thessalonians, A. D. 53; and within the next ten 
years all the rest of his writings, with the possible excep- 
tion of the Pastoral Epistles, were composed.’ These epis- 
tles contain invaluable testimony to events in the history 
of Jesus, But they also cite His words. This is done 
with explicit formality in 1 Cor. xi. 23-25, where are 
given the words of Christ at the institution of the Lord’s 
Supper; which, as the language of Paul implies, came 
to him mediately. There is every reason to suppose 
that his authority was one of the first disciples? In one 
of the discourses of Paul, which is reported by Luke,’ a say- 
ing of Jesus is cited, which the Evangelist, be it observed, 


‘ Baur conceded the genuineness of the two Epistles to the Corinthi- 
ans, the Romans, and Galatians. Hilgenfeld adds to the list I. Thessa- 
lonians, Philippians, and Philemon. inl. in d. N. T., pp. 239, 331, 
333. On the genuineness of the other Pauline Epistles, see Essays on 
the Supernatural Origin of Christ., pp- 274, 275. 

*See Neander, Corintherbriefe, p. 182, Leben Jesu, p. 10; Plant. and 
Trav. of the Ch. (Robinson’s ed.), p. 107. 

* Acts xx. 35. 


THE SYNOPTICAL GOSPELS. 259 


had not included in his Gospel. Scattered through the 
epistles of Paul, there are numerous evident allusions to ut- 
terances of Jesus. All things considered, the probability is 
decidedly in favor of a use by Paul of a writing which in- 
cluded at least important portions of the teachings of the 
Lord. 

Whether any memoranda of His teachings, or incidents 
in His ministry, were made during His life-time by any of 
those who heard Him, is doubtful. There is no evidence to 
warrant us in saying with confidence that records of this 
kind were then made. The oldest written Gospels of 
which we are possessed are unquestionably the first three. 
The title “ Gospel” is a synonym of the Good Tidings of 
Salvation, by which the prophecies were fulfilled, or the 
history of Jesus during His life on earth. The specifications 
“according to Matthew,” “according to Mark,” “ according 
to Luke,” refer the several narratives to these sources re- 
spectively. This would not necessarily imply that these per- 
sons were themselves the authors of the books respectively, 
yet such in all probability is what in the case of these titles 
is meant. ὦ 

These three are styled the Synoptical Gospels in conse- 
quence of their affinities to one another, and their common 
distinction from John. They rest upon a common basis; 
they are branches of one stock. * 

This resemblance exists with regard to the disposition of 
matter.* The first and third Gospels begin with the pe- 
riod anterior to the appearance of John the Baptist. Here, 
at the point where the preaching of John begins, they are 
joined by Mark. Then follows, in all three, the Baptism 


1See Bleek, Hinl. in d. N. T. (Mangold’s ed.) 3 38. 

27De Wette, Hinl. ind, Ν. T 377. 

* See Holtzmann, Die Synoptisch, Evangg. 32 (p. 10, seq.) De Wette, 
Einl. 3.79, a. 


260 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


and Temptation, the public Teaching of Jesus in Galilee, 
and the Journey to Jerusalem—under which head Luke 
introduces a considerable amount of matter not contained 
in the other two. Then all describe the entry into Jerusa- 
lem, the Last Supper, and the Betrayal, Death,and Resur- 
rection of the Lord. In all of them the history is pre- 
sented, not in a continuous flow, but in a series of numer- 
ous brief narratives or sections, linked together. Of the 
numervus instances of the sick healed by Jesus, the three 
Evangelists select the same; and a like agreement is found 
with regard to the teachings of Jesus, although He uttered 
so much that is recorded by neither. Matthew and Luke 
record the woe pronounced over Chorazin and Bethsaida 
(Matt. xi. 21-24; Luke x. 13-15), but neither reports 
“the mighty works” to which the Saviour’s words refer. 
The Synoptists connect together in the same manner sepa- 
rate narratives ; for example, the selections relating to the 
Baptism, Temptation, and Return to Galilee; the Storm 
upon the Lake, and the Gadarenes; the Plucking of the 
Ears of Corn, and the Healing of the Withered Hand; 
the Confession of Peter, and the Prophecy of the Passion ; 
the Healing of the Blind at Jericho, and the Entrance of 
Jesus into Jerusalem. 

But the problems presented for solution cannot be un- 
derstood without taking into view the extent of verbal agree- 
ment in the three narratives, and without considering the 
differences in connection with the correspondences that are 
found to exist. The coincidence is in fragments, inter- 
rupted by dissimilar ideas and facts.? It is the variations 
both in language and detail, occurring often in the midst 
of close correspondences in both particulars, that occasion 
perplexity, and render the questions suggested by the phe- 


1 Holtzmann, p. 11. 
2 See Norton, Genuineness of the Gospels, I., Note D., p. cx. 


THE SYNOPTICAL GOSPELS. 261 


nomena among the most curious and difficult ever offered 
for literary criticism. 

1. Sometimes there is an exact verbal agreement in all 
three. “ Prepare the way of the Lord: make His paths 
straight,” is a passage identically the same in all, although 
it differs in form both from the Hebrew and from the 
Septuagint,—the Greek version used by the New Testa- 
ment writers (Matt. iii. 3; Mark i. 3; Luke iii. 4). This 
is one of many examples. 

2. This verbal identity is found in cases where the terms 
and constructions are peculiar. 


Mart. xvi. 28. Mark ix. 21. LUKE ix. 27: 


—“There be some| —‘Therebe some of| —‘ There be some 
standing here that shall|them that stand here|standing here which 
not taste of death till] which shall not taste of| shall not taste οὐ death 
they see,” etc. death till they see,” etc. | till they see,” evs. 


Here, with slight verbal deviations in the origiaal, all 
have the same peculiar phrase—“ shall not taste of death,” 
(οὐ μὴ γεύσωνται ϑανάτου). In the passage (Matt. ix. 15, 
Mark ii. 20, Luke ν. 35), “when the bridegroom shall 
be taken away,” there is the same peculiar term (ἀπαρϑῇ) 
in all. Not a few unusual terms, or collocations of terms, 
are common to the three Evangelists.' 

3. Verbal coincidences are principally in te report of 
Christ’s words, or of the words of others, and are compara- 
tively unfrequent in the connected narratives. This is a 
phenomenon which has an important bearing on the ques- 
tion of the origin and mutual relation of the Synoptists. In 
passages common to all three, one-sixth of the matter con- 
sists in verbal coincidences ; and of these one fifth is in the 
narrative portion, and four-fifths in the recitative parts. 
Of the coincident matter common to Matthew and Mark, 


1 For other illustrations under this head, see Holtzmann, p. 12. 


262 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


five-sixths is found in the recitative passages. In the mat- 
ter common to Matthew and Luke exclusively, and in that 
common to Mark and Luke exclusively, there are, with 
two important exceptions, no verbal coincidences except in 
the recitative portions.’ As might be expected from these 
statements, there is a marked difference of style between 
the narrative parts, and the reports of what is said—the 
recitative parts—in the Synoptical Gospels. 


4, The quotations from the Old Testament which are 
found in these Gospels may throw some light upon the 
problems before us. One fact is that the citations which 
are common to all three are from the Septuagint; in the 
very few instances where these quotations vary from the 
Septuagint form, the same variations are found in all. 
Another fact is that in Matthew, nearly all the quotations 
in the “pragmatic” part of the Gospel—the passages 
which begin with “in order that it might be fulfilled ” 
(ἕνα πληρωθῇ); passages which consist of the Evangelist’s 
own comments or reflections—are founded upon the He- 
brew text, although almost every one of them shows also 
the influence of the Septuagint. They are from the Sep- 
tuagint, but are modified by regard to the Hebrew orig- 
inal. On the contrary, in the remaining portions of Mat- 
thew, the Old Testament quotations are drawn wholly 
from the Septuagint.2, In Mark, the passage in i. 2, which 
embodies a reflection of the Evangelist, is from the He- 
brew. The passage in xv. 28, which is from the Septua- 
gint, is expunged from the text by Tischendorf: it was in- 
troduced into the manuscripts from Luke. So that in the 
only instance of the kind in Mark (i. 2), the same rule 


1 These calculations are by Norton, Vol. I., Note D. See also Westcott, 
Introd. to the Gospels, p. 203. 


3 Holtzmann, pp. 13, 259. 


THE SYNOPTICAL GOSPELS. 263 


holds as in Matthew. All of Luke’s citations, with a 
single exception, are from the Septuagint.' 

5. The hypothesis of a primitive written Gospel which 
furnished to each of the Evangelists the matter which is 
common to all of them, each being supposed to write inde- 
pendently of the others, is at present regarded with little 
favor.’ According to this hypothesis, a Gospel was early 
written in the Aramaic, the current dialect of Palestine, 
and soon translated into Greek. This Gospel furnished 
Apostles and preachers with a kind of manual for their 
own use and for the instruction of their converts. Its 
contents were amplified by each of the Evangelists from 
sources peculiar to himself. In process of time, the more 
copious Gospels superseded the briefer narrative, which 
accordingly disappeared. 

The hypothesis of such a Gospel, which was possessed 
of a quasi official recognition, hardly accords with the pro- 
bable circumstances under which the first evangelical wri- 
ting occurred. But if a book of this kind existed, the fact 
that no mention is made of it by any of the ancient eccle- 
siastical writers constitutes a difficulty. Luke (i. 1 seq.) 
apparently knew of no such authoritative document. ἢ 
Moreover, no document having the character ascribed to 
the Primitive Gospel, can be framed out of the common 
matter in the three Gospels of the Canon. When we 
come to the history of the crucifixion, resurrection, and 
ascension of Christ, the variations of the canonical Gospels 
from one another are most marked—are so marked that 
the hypothetical primitive document must have been, as 
regards this part of the biography of Jesus, of the most 
meagre character. Besides, it is impossible to explain the 
omission of much material by one Evangelist, which, as it 


1 Holtzmann, p. 263. 
? See Reuss, Heilig. Schrift. d. N. T., p. 79. 


264 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


is found in the other two, must have entered into the ori- 
ginal narrative. 

6. Schleiermacher’s theory, as applied to Luke, of a 
great number of detached narratives brought together, is 
equally unsatisfactory. 

Of the 124 sections in the three Gospels—short narra- 
tives capable of being separated from the context—47 are 
found in all, 12 in Matthew and Mark, 2 in Matthew and 
Luke, 6 in Mark and Luke, 17 in Matthew alone, 2 in 
Mark alone, 28 in Luke alone. The text of Luke has 93 
sections, of Matthew 78, of Mark 67. 

The idea of Schleiermacher was that these sections were 
the primitive memoranda of disciples, which being collected 
and connected together, with additions from oral sources, 
constitute the present synoptical Gospels. This theory 
was better adapted to explain the differences than the co- 
incidences of the Evangelists. How is it that, in so many 
instances, sections which might stand apart, are united by 
two or more of the Synoptists? How shall we explain 
the general accordance that exists in the disposition of ma- 
terials so incoherent? Had we but one Evangelist instead 
of three, this hypothesis would present higher claims to 
acceptance. 

7. The theory of a primitive oral Gospel has been 
adopted, and is still held by many, as the true explanation 
of the correspondences and differences in the Synoptists. 
As drawn out in an early essay of Gieseler,’ it presupposes 
a common stock of oral narrative, from which each of the 
Evangelists drew. This body of narrative, it is supposed, 
formed itself by the necessity under which the Apostles 
were placed of instructing their converts, and the first 
preachers of the new faith, with respect to the life and 


1 I follow, in these calculations, Reuss, p. 175. 
2 Historisch-kritischer Versuch, etc. (1818). 


THE SYNOPTICAL GOSPELS. 265 


teachings of the Lord. The union of the Apostles at Je- 
rusalem, and the natural tendency, which is specially strong 
among the unlettered, to give a stereotyped form to narra- 
tives which are frequently rehearsed, caused the Gospel 
story to be repeated, to a great extent, in the same phrase- 
ology. In particular, the sayings of Jesus would be re- 
cited in the same words; and this would also be true of 
the sayings of other persons who appear in the narrative. 
As soon as the narrative, or portions of it, commenced to 
be written down, as in the first essays in the composition 
of Gospels to which Luke refers (i. 1), they would also aid 
in fixing it in one verbal form. At the same time, differ- 
ences would exist according to the varying recollections of 
individuals who had occasion to relate the history of Jesus, 
and to make it known to converts in different places. In 
addition to a common stock of narrative, persons might 
become separately possessed of information peculiar to 
themselves. Hence, when the Gospels of the canon were 
composed, there was a main trunk, as it were, ramifying 
into distinct branches. 

This hypothesis has the merit of taking into view both 
elements, the agreement and the diversity which co-exist 
in the Synoptical histories. It derives some support from 
the manner in which the instructions of the Rabbis, em- 
bracing such a vast amount of matter, were accurately re- 
membered and transmitted by their pupils; and by the 
familiar fact that memory does its work best when it is 
most relied on, and when there is less dependence upon 
written helps. It involves, also, one assumption, of the 
truth of which there is no doubt, that there was an inter- 
val when the words and works of Jesus had no other 
record than that furnished by the memories of His fol- 
lowers. Moreover, the theory of an oral transmission of 
the primitive Gospel is, to a certain extent, corroborated by 


266 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


authentic historical testimonies. Luke (i. 1, 2) refers to 
the contents of the evangelical history as “delivered ” to 
him and his fellow-disciples by the original witnesses and 
‘ministers of the word; ” and the meaning of the term is 
that these facts were orally communicated. Papias, the 
earliest of the ecclesiastical writers who refer to the com- 
position of the Gospels, states that Mark made up his nar- 
rative out of what he had heard from the lips of Peter. 
Notwithstanding the truth which is included in this 
hypothesis, there are difficulties in it when regarded as a 
complete solution. It assumes a kind of concert among 
the Apostles in the work of framing a consecutive narrative, 
of which there is no explicit proof, and which, under the 
circumstances, strikes one as somewhat artificial. Then it 
appears from the Acts and the Epistles that the first 
preachers of Christianity dwelt chiefly upon certain parts 
of the Saviour’s history, in particular His crucifixion and 
resurrection, without recounting in detail—at least on the 
first promulgation of the Gospel—the works and teachings 
of Jesus. But the main obstacle in the way of consider- 
ing this hypothesis adequate of itself, is the nature and ex- 
tent of that agreement, reaching as it does to minutia, 
to peculiar forms of words and turns of expression, which 
subsist among the Synoptical writers. Sentences of com- 
plicated structure are found in the same identical form in 
more than one of them.’ This sort of agreement in narra- 
tives propagated by the living voice alone, in different 
places and after a considerable interval of time, is difficult 
to account for. This is the principal objection to the hypo- 
thesis in question, although the extent of the diversity in 
some cases, especially in the narratives of the last days of 
Jesus and of the circumstances connected with the Resur- 
rection, is likewise a difficulty of no inconsiderable weight. 


1 For an illustration, see Holtzmann, p. 51. 


THE SYNOPTICAL GOSPELS. 267 


8. On account of these reasons for believing the hypo- 
thesis of an oral Gospel, acquiring a certain fixedness by 
frequent repetition, insufficient, most scholars at the pres- 
ent time are inclined to blend this hypothesis with the 
supposition of a certain influence of one Evangelist upon an- 
other, or of an acquaintance on the part of one with the 
written work of another. Oral communication may have 
been a source, and a leading source of the materials which 
enter into the Gospels, at the same time that one of the 
Evangelists may have been affected, both in his choice of 
incidents to narrate, and in his selection of phraseology, by 
the example of another. In other words, in the case of one 
or more of the Synoptists, oral and written sources may have 
been combined to furnish the writer with the contents of 
his book; the written source, however, not being a primi- 
tive anonymous Gospel, but consisting, either wholly or 
in part, of one or another of the three. 

Among those who have held to the interdependence of 
the Gospels, there have been all possible varieties of opi- 
nion on the question of priority. The hypothesis of 
Griesbach, which placed Matthew first and Mark latest, 
with Luke between them, had for a long time a wide 
acceptance. Mark was regarded as the product of an 
abridgment of the older narratives. More thorough inves- 
tigation has reversed this verdict. What is the true posi- 
tion of Mark in relation to the other Synoptists ? 

(1.) An examination of the contents of the first three 
gospels show that the resemblances between Matthew and 
Mark, and between Luke and Mark, are greater than be- 
tween Matthew and Luke, with regard to the materials 
common to the three. There are certain parallel passages 
where one descriptive phrase is found in Matthew, and 
another in Luke, while both are connected in Mark. 
Thus in the account of the Healing of the Leper, Mat- 


268 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


thew says (viii. 3): “And immediately his leprosy was 
cleansed.” Luke (v.13) says: “And immediately his 
leprosy departed from him;” but Mark connects the two 
expressions (i. 42): “Immediately the leprosy departed 
from him, and he was cleansed.” ' The following is an- 
other instance : 


Marr. viii. 16. MarK i. 82. Lux iy. 40. 
—‘‘When the even| —“And at even,}| —‘ Now when the 
was come, they brought | when the sun did set, |SUN was setting, all 
unto him many that| they brought unto him | they that had any sick 
were possessed with | all that were diseased, | with divers diseases, 
devils.” and them that were|brought them unto 
possessed with devils.” | Him.” 


The first impression undoubtedly is that Mark has com- 
bined the statements of the other two Evangelists. But 
this impression is removed when it is observed that a coup- 
ling of phrases is a peculiarity of Mark’s style, that in 
Mark there are none of the linguistic peculiarities of either 
of the other two Gospels, as would have been the case had 
he thus borrowed from them, and that in the most striking 
instance of a seeming combination, which is quoted above, 
another solution liesat hand. Mark says (i. 32): “ And at 
even, when the sun did ει." This last phrase is added, 
because, according to Mark (verses 21, 29), it was the Sab- 
bath: the sick were not brought to Jesus until the Sabbath 
was over. Matthew, however, does not refer to a Sabbath 
in connection with these miracles, and had no occasion to 
point out that the sun had gone down. Luke, who like 
Mark, speaks of the Sabbath as the date of the occurrences, 
naturally makes express reference to the setting of the sun. 
Nothing can be inferred, therefore, unfavorable to the in- 
dependence of Mark from this comparison. 


* For still other examples, see De Wette, 280; Bleek (Ed. Mangold), 
Ῥ. 290. 


THE GOSPEL OF MARK. 269 


(2.) Other evidences of Mark’s independence are of 
great weight. He begins with the public ministry of Jesus, 
the subject, according to Peter, of the Apostles’ testimony. ὦ 
Why, if he had the other Gospels before him, should he 
omit the preliminary history, and why should he omit so 
much—the Lord’s discourses, for example—which they 
contain? Why should he write a Gospel which contains 
so little not already on record in the other two? The 
character of the matter in Mark’s Gospel speaks for its 
early date and independence. 

That Mark did not copy from Matthew is shown by 
certain divergences which would be unaccountable on the 
opposite supposition. Matthew (viii. 28-34) narrates the 
healing of two demoniacs together at Gadara; Mark (and 
Luke also) speaks of but one (Mark y. 1-21, Luke viii. 26- 
40). Matthew (xx. 29-34) likewise has two blind men 
who were healed together at Jericho; Mark (and, with 
him, Luke) speaks of but one (Mark x. 46-52, Luke xviii. 
35-48, xix. 1). If Mark had been the copyist of Matthew, 
we could not easily account for this needless and unex- 
pected deviation from his authority. 

(3.) The narratives in Mark do not exhibit him as an 
abbreviator : he is often more full than Matthew or Luke ; 
and this, not as if he were merely expanding matter fur- 
nished from them, but as one independent in the sources of 
his information. The healing of the Paralytic is thus de- 
scribed by Matthew and Mark :— 


Mart. ix. 2-8. Mark ii. 3-12. 

2 And, behold, they brought unto | 8 And they came unto him, 
him a man sick of the palsy, lying | bringing one sick of the palsy, 
on a bed; which was borne of four. 

4 And when they could not come 
nigh unto him for the press, they 
uncovered the roof where he was: 


1 Acts ii, 21, 22, 


270 


and Jesus seeing 
their faith said unto the sick of 
the palsy: Son, be of good cheer; 
thy sins be forgiven thee. 
3 And, behold, certain of the 
scribes said within themselves, 
This man blasphemeth. 


4 And Jesus knowing their 
thoughts said, Wherefore think ye 
evil in your hearts? 


5 For whether is easier, to say, 
Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to 
say, Arise, and walk? 


6 But that ye may know that the 
Son of man hath power on earth to 
forgive sins (then saith he to the 
sick of the palsy), Arise, take up 
thy bed, and go unto thine house. 

7 And he arose, and departed to 
his house. 

8 But when the multitudes saw 
it, they marvelled, and glorified 
God, which had given such power 
unto men. 


THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


and when they had broken it up, 
they let down the bed wherein the 
sick of the palsy lay. 

5 When Jesus saw their faith, he 
said unto the sick of the palsy, 
Son, thy sins be forgiven thee. 

6 But there were certain of the 
scribes sitting there, and reasoning 
in their hearts, 

7 Why doth this man thus speak 
blasphemy ? who can forgive sins 
but God only? 

8 And immediately, when Jesus 
perceived in his spirit that they so 
reasoned within themselves, he 
said unto them, Why reason ye 
these things in your hearts? 

9 Whether is it easier to say to 
the sick of the palsy, Thy sins 
be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, 
and take up thy bed, and walk? 

10 But that ye may know that 
the Son of man hath power on 
earth to forgive sins (hesaith to 
the sick of the palsy), 

11 I say unto thee Arise, and 
take up thy bed, and go thy way 
into thine house. 

12 And immediately he arose, 
took up the bed, and went forth 
before them all; insomuch that 
they glorified God, saying, We 
never saw it on this fashion. 


The healing of the Demoniac is thus related by the three 


Evangelists :— 


Marv. xvii. 14-21. 
14 And when they 


titude, 


Mark ix. 14-29. 

14 And when he 
were come to the mul-| came to his disciples, 
he saw a great multi- 
tude about them, and 


LuKE ix. 37-43. 

87 And it came to 
pass, that on the next 
day, when they were 
come down from the 


THE SYNOPTICAL GOSPELS. 


There came to hima 
certain man, kneeling 
down to him, and say- 
ing, 

15 Lord, have mercy 
on my son; for he is 
lunatic,and sore vexed : 
for oft-times he falleth 
into the fire, and oft 
into the water. 

16 And I brought 
him to thy disciples, 
and they could not 
cure him. 

17 Then Jesus an- 
swered and said, O 
faithless and perverse 
generation, how long 
shall I be with you? 
how long shall I suffer 
you? bring him hither 
to me. 


the scribes questioning 
with them. 

15 And straightway 
all the people when 
they beheld him, were 
greatly amazed, and 
running to him saluted 
him. 

16 And he asked the 
scribes, What question 
ye with them? 

17 And one of the 
multitude answered, 
and said, Master, 1 
have brought unto thee 
my son, which hath a 
dumb spirit : 

18 And wheresoever 
he taketh him, he tear- 
eth him; and he foam- 
eth, and gnasheth with 
his teeth, and pineth 
away: and I spake to 
thy disciples that they 
should cast him out; 
and they could not. 


19 He answereth him 
and saith, O faithless 
generation, how long 
shall I be with you? 
how long shall I suffer 
you? bring him unto 
me. 


20 And they brought 
him unto him: and 
when he saw him, 
straightway the spirit 
tare him; and he fell 
on the ground, and 
wa]lowed foaming. 


21 And he asked his 
father, How long is it 


271 


hill, much people met 
him. 


38 And, behold a 
man of the company 
cried out, saying, Mas- 
ter I beseech thee, look 
upon my son; for he is 
my only child. 

39 § And, lo, a spirit 
taketh him, and he 
suddenly crieth out; 
and it teareth him that 
he foameth again, and 
bruising him, hardly 
departeth from him. 

40 And 1 besought 
thy disciples to cast 
him out; and they 
could not. 

41 And Jesus answer- 
ing said, O faithless 
and perverse genera- 
tion, how long shall I 
be with you, and suffer 
you? Bring thy son 
hither. 

42 And as he was yet 
a coming, the devil 
threw him down and 
tare him. 


272 


18 And Jesus rebuk- 
ed the devil; and he 
departed out of him: 
and the child was cured 
from that very hour. 

19 Then came the 
disciples to Jesus apart, 
and said, Why could 
not we cast him out? 

20 And Jesus said 
unto them, Because of 
your unbelief: For ver- 
ily I say unto you, if 
ye have faith asa grain 
of mustard seed, ye 
shall say unto this 
mountain, Remove 
hence to yonder place; 
and it shall remove: 


ago since this came un- 
to him? And he said, 
Of a child. 


22 And oft-times it 
hath cast him into the 
fire, and into the waters, 
to destroy him: but if 
thou canst do anything 
have compassion on us, 
and help us. 


23 Jesus said unto 
him, If thou canst be- 
lieve, all things are 
possible to him that 
believeth. 

24 And straightway 
the father of the child 
cried out, and said with 
tears, Lord, I believe; 
help thou mine unbe- 
lief. 

25 When Jesus saw 
that the people came 
running together, he 
rebuked the foul spirit, 
saying unto him, Thou 
dumb and deaf spirit, 
I charge thee come out 
of him, and enter no 
more into him. 


26 And the spirit cried, 
and rent him sore, and 
came out of him; and 
he was as one dead; 
insomuch that many 
said, He is dead. 

27 But Jesus took 
him by the hand, and 
lifted him up; and he 
arose, 

28 And when he was 
come into the house, 


THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


And Jesus rebuked 
the unclean spirit, and 
healed the child, and 
delivered him again to 
his father. 


THE GOSPEL OF MARK. 


and nothing shall be 
impossible unto you. 


21 Howbeit this 
kind goeth not out but 
by prayer and fasting. 


his disciples asked him 
privately, Why could 
not we cast him out ? 

29 And~he said unto 
them, This kind can 
come forth by nothing, 
but by prayer and fast- 
ing. 


273 


The three Evangelists write thus of Herod and John 


the Baptist :— 


Marr. xiv. 1-2, 6-12. 


1 Ar that time Herod 
the tetrarch heard of 
the fame of Jesus, 

2 And said unto his 
servants, This is John 
the Baptist; he is risen 
from the dead; and 
therefore mighty works 
do shew forth them- 
selves in him, 


6 But when Herod’s 
birthday was kept, the 
daughter of Herodias 
danced before them, 
and pleased Herod. 

7 Whereupon he pro- 
mised with an oath to 
give her whatsoever she 
would ask. 


18 


Mark vi. 14-16, 21-29. 


14 And king Herod 
heard of him; (for his 
name was spread 
abroad;) and he said, 
That John the Baptist 
was risen from the dead, 
and therefore mighty 
works do shew forth 
themselves in him. 

15 Others said, That 
itis Elias. And others 
said, That it is a pro- 
phet, or as one of the 
prophets. 

16 But when Herod 
heard thereof, he said, 
It is John, whom I be- 
headed: heis risen from 
the dead. 


21 And when a con- 
venient day was come, 
that Herod on his birth- 
day made a supper to 
his lords, high captains, 
and chief estates of Ga- 
lilee: 

22 And when the 
daughter of the said 


LUKE ix. 7-9. 


7 Now Herod the te- 
trarch heard of all that 
was done by him: and 
he was perplexed, be- 
cause that it was said 
of some, that John was 
risen from the dead; 

8 And of some, that 
Elias had appeared; 
and of others, that one 
of the old prophets was 
risen again. 

9 And Herod said, 
John have I beheaded ; 
but who isthis, of whom 
Thearsuch things? And 
he desired to see him. 


274 


8. And she, being be- 
fore instructed of her 
mother, said, Give me 
here John Baptist’s 
head in a charger. 

9 And the king was 
sorry: nevertheless for 
the oath’s sake, and 
them which sat with 
him at meat, he com- 
manded it to be given 
her. 

10 And he sent and 
beheaded John in the 
prison. 

11 And his head was 
brought in a charger, 
and given to the dam- 
sel: and she brought τύ 
to her mother. 

12 And his disciples 
came, and took up the 
body, and buried it, and 
went and told Jesus. 


THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Herodias came in, and 
danced, and pleased 
Herod and them that 
sat with him, the king 
said unto the damsel, 
Ask of me whatsoever 
thou wilt, and I will 
give it thee. 


23 And he sware unto 
her, Whatsoever thou 
shalt ask of me, I will 
give it thee, unto the 
half of my kingdom. 

24 Andshe went forth, 
and said unto her mo- 
ther, What shall I ask? 
And she said, The head 
of John the Baptist. 


25 And she came in 
straightway with haste 
unto .the king, and 
asked, saying, I will 
that thou give me by 
and by in a charger the 
head of John the Bap- 
tist. 

26 And the king was 
exceeding sorry; yet 
for his oath’s sake, and 
for their sakes which 
sat with him, he would 
not reject her. 

27 And immediately 
the king sent an execu- 
tioner, and commanded 
his head to be brought: 
and he went and be- 
headed him in the pri- 
son, 

28 And brought his 
head in a charger, and 
gave it to the damsel; 


THE GOSPEL OF MARK. 275 


and the damsel gave it 
to her mother. 

29 And when his dis- 
ciples heard of it, they 
came and took up his 
corpse, and laid it ina 
tomb. 


(4) The lively style of Mark, with the graphic touches 
which are mingled in his narrative, are as far as possible 
from being characteristic of a copyist. 

They are best explained by supposing an access to orig- 
nal sources on the part of the writer. So fresh a con- 
ception of the facts narrated belongs not to one who is 
transcribing what has been recorded by other authors. 
Especially is it important to remark that many of the cir- 
cumstances which are peculiar to his narrative, bear on 
them the plain stamp of historical verity. 


The independence of Mark as related to the other Gos- 
pels, is one of the most assured and most valuable results 
of recent criticism. The question arises now whether the 
second Gospel had a direct influence upon the composition 
of the first and third ? 

This question is answered affirmatively by many scholars. 
It is supposed to have been in the hands of the other Syn- 
optists, and in this way, partly, their mutual agreement is 
accounted for. 

But certain able critics who do not hold to an actual use 
of Mark by the other two Evangelists, and who make oral 
tradition the one prime source of all three works, never- 
theless hold that Mark represents this tradition in its 
first form. Thus Professor Westcott holds that the 
“many” earlier attempts at recording the evangelical 
history, to which Luke (i. 1) adverts, aided in giving 
fixedness to the form of the oral tradition; and that the 


276 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Gospel of Mark contributed to the same result, help- 
ing, also, to establish that general outline of the Saviour’s 
ministry, or distribution of the matter, which we find pre- 
served in all three. But he does not, it would seem, deem 
it necessary to suppose that the second Gospel was actually 
used by the other Synoptists in composing their books," or 
even that it was necessarily first written. 

Of the origin of the Second Gospel the ancient ecclesias- 
tical writers give an account which there is no good reason 
to distrust. Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, is called by 
Eusebius ‘‘a companion” of Polycarp, a pupil of the Apos- 
tle John. Polycarp was born A.D. 69, and died, as it is 
now ascertained, A. D. 155. Papias had himself known 
some of the immediate disciples of Jesus. In a fragment 
quoted by Eusebius from his “Exposition of the Oracles 
of the Lord,” he says of one of the disciples, the Presbyter, 
or Elder, John :— 


“ And the Elder said this: ‘Mark, having become the interpreter of 
Peter, wrote down accurately whatever he remembered, not, however, 
recording in order (ἐν τάξει) what was either said or done by Christ. 
For neither did he hear the Lord, nor did he follow Him; but after- 
wards, as I said, he [attended] Peter, who adapted his instructions to 
the needs [of his hearers], but not as designing to furnish a connected 
account (σύνταξιν) of the Lord’s oracles (κυριακῶν λογίων or λόγων); so 
that Mark made no mistake while thus writing down some things as he 
remembered them. For of one thing he took care—to omit nothing 
which he heard, and not to set down any false statement therein.’” 
“Such,” adds Eusebius, “is the relation in Papias concerning Mark. 
But concerning Matthew, this is said: ‘So then Matthew wrote the 
oracles (τὰ λόγια) in the Hebrew language, and every one interpreted 
them as he was able.’” ? 


Trenzeus tells us that after the death of Peter and Paul at 
Rome, Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, “gave 
to us in writing what had been uttered by Peter in his 
preaching.” * 'The Gospel is ascribed to Mark by Clement 


1 Introd. to the Gospels, pp. 213, 214. 2 Euseb., H. E., iii. 39. 
3 Adv. Her., III. i. 1. 


THE GOSPEL OF MARK. ΡΤ 


of Alexandria, Origen, Eusebius, Jerome, and others. 
The statement of Papias, the earliest testimony on the 
subject, has been a fruitful subject of scrutiny and debate. 
The important question is whether he refers to the canonical 
Gospel in its existing form, or to a primitive Mark, of 
which our Gospel is a later recension. No mention of 
such a primitive Mark is made by any ancient writer ; if 
such a work existed, it perished without making a sign. 
Considering the time when Papias wrote, it seems quite 
improbable that a Gospel of Mark could have been in the 
hands of Papias, and, as we must infer, in general circula- 
tion at that time, of which these writers had never heard. 
Papias implies that the Gospel written by Mark was 
incomplete. The comparative brevity of the second Gospel, 
and its omission of so much matter which the other Gos- 
pels contain, justifies this comment. That the Gospel 
should be said to want orderly or chronological arrange- 
ment is not, to be sure, so easy of explanation. It is possi- 
ble, however, that Papias had in mind the orderly arrange- 
ment of John’s Gospel. Another writer, the author of 
the Muratorian fragment, speaks of Mark’s relation to 
Peter in terms similar to those used by Papias, and pro- 
ceeds to characterize John’s Gospel as an orderly record. 
Dr. Lightfoot considers it probable that this author was 
acquainted with the corresponding statements of Papias, 
and affords a clue to their meaning. ! 

But whatever may have moved Papias to this comment 
upon Mark, to postulate, on account of it, the existence of 
a work otherwise unknown is too heavy a load for such a 


1 Contemporary Review, Oct. 1875. May not Papias have had in 
mind the prologue of Luke,where the orderly arrangement—évaré£aobat 
deqynow—is set down as a leading object in composing the Gospels? 
That Luke was known te Papias, it is safe to affirm. The silence of 
Eusebius (in his quotations from Papias), as will be seen hereafter, is 
not of the slightest weight against this proposition. 


278 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


remark to bear, which may be in fact only the impression 
of an individual. When we turn to the internal grounds 
which Professor Holtzmann and other advocates of the 
“ Ur-Marcus” hypothesis bring forward in behalf of their 
own opinion, we find them, to be sure, not destitute of 
plausibility ; but they savor too much of conjecture to 
produce conviction. The critics, however, who assume 
a primitive Mark, the predecessor of the canonical Gospel, 
hold that the earlier work comprised nearly all the matter 
which our Gospel contains. It is a fair and unavoidable 
conclusion of the most searching criticism that in the second 
Gospel is presented substantially the testimony which was 
given by the immediate disciples of Christ, although it 
includes of course but a fraction of the works which He 
performed, and a smaller portion of His words. 

“But concerning Matthew, this is said: ‘So then Mat- 
thew wrote the oracles (τὰ λόγεα) in the Hebrew language 
and every one interpreted them as he was 8016. Irenzeus 
says: “So Matthew put forth a Gospel among the Hebrews 
in their own dialect, while Peter and Paul at Rome were 
preaching the Gospel and founding the Church.”’ The 
Hebrew original of the Gospel is also asserted by Jerome 
and by other Fathers. Of these patristic testimonies, that 
of Papias is the earliest and most important. 

1. The first question to be determined with regard to 
the statement of Papias is the sense of the term “Oracles” 
(λόγια). Schleiermacher introduced the interpretation, in 
which he has been followed by a large number of critics, 
which makes Papias refer, under this term, exclusively to 
“discourses” of Christ, and which holds that the Aramaic 
Gospel which he describes consisted solely of these. 

To this interpretation we are not at all compelled by 
philology. The term Logia—Oracles—is used by early 


1 Eusebius, H. E., iii.39. ? Adv. Her. iii. 1 (Euseb., H. Εἰ, v. 8). 


THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW. 279 


ecclesiastical writers for the Scriptures, as including both 
narrative matter and discourses.’ That Gospels might be 
designated as Scriptures, and referred to as it was customary 
to refer to the Old Testament, is proved by a passage in the 
Epistle of Barnabas, which was written very early in the 
second century—a generation earlier than the work of Pa- 
pias; for that Epistle introduces a quotation from Matthew 
with the words: ‘It is written.”* There is nothing in the 
fragment of Papias to make it certain that the statement 
respecting Matthew, like that respecting Mark, was from 
John the Presbyter: it may have been from some other 
authority. If it was from John the Presbyter, it is prob- 
able that it did not stand in connection with the passage 
relative to Mark. Hence, no contrast between the con- 
tents of Mark, as embracing both deeds and words, and 
Matthew as including only one element, can be intended. 
But in the passage about Mark, there is no reason for re- 
stricting the sense of Logia, and for holding that Papias 
attributes a want of arrangement to the discourses in this 
Evangelist, which he does not attribute to his narrative of 
the acts of Christ. Papias speaks of a want of orderly ar- 
rangement in what Mark wrote down, specifying both the 
deeds and words of Jesus. Then, explaining that Mark 
had not himself heard the Lord, he reiterates the remark 
that he did not make an orderly arrangement (σύνταξιν) of 
the Zogia. Frum the collocation of words in this last re- 
mark, it is evident that no stress is laid upon Logia, as if 
the discourses in their lack of arrangement were distin- 
guished from another portion of the Gospel, which would 
be contrary to what Papias had just said. Hence it is 
altogether more natural to take this term as a synonym of 


1 See Dr. Lightfoot’s remarks, Cont. Review, 1875, p. 399 seq.; Bleek, 
Finl. in d. N. T., p. 115 seq. 
3 Barnab. Epist. iv. 


280 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


‘“‘ what was either said or done” (7 λεχϑέντα ἢ πραχϑέντα). 
In short, there is nothing in either passage separately 
taken, nor in the conjunction of the two, to support the 
theory of Schleiermacher concerning the meaning of Papias.’ 

It is very improbable that Papias had in mind any other 
Aramaic Gospel than the work which Irenzus and his con- 
temporaries referred to as having been composed by the 
Evangelist in that language. It is not to be assumed that 
these writers all derived their information on this point 
from Papias. If they did, they all understood him as speak- 
ing of the entire Gospel, and not of the discourses alone. 
If they did not derive their information from him, then the 
fact involved in the old interpretation given to Papias is 
confirmed by independent authorities, 2 

The theory that Matthew’s authorship was confined to 
a book of the Lord’s discourses must depend for its sup- 
port, not upon the language of Papias, but upon internal 
peculiarities of the Gospel itself. The manner in which 
discourses are grouped together in the First Gospel, the 
mode in which Matthew himself is referred to, it being 
supposed that Matthew would not speak of himself in this 
way; the omission of events which an Apostle might be 
expected to record, such as the interviews of Jesus with the 
Disciples after the Resurrection, of which we have accounts 
from Paul (1 Cor. xv. 3-9), and from the other Evangel- 
ists,—these and other characteristics of the First Gospel 
are urged as reasons for disconnecting the narrative portion 
of the book from Matthew. This work, it is claimed, was 
a collection of the Lord’s discourses, which received after- 
wards the supplement of narrative by which they are 
broken up into large fragments. 


? Renan holds that our Mark answers to the description of Papias 
Les Evangiles, pp. 126, 120. 
2 See Lightfoot, Ibid., p. 399. 


THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW. 281 


But admitting the phenomena which are here pointed 
out, and the difficulties which they suggest, it is doubtful 
whether a division of the Gospel in the way proposed is 
the right solution of the problems thus presented. 

2. On the question whether the first Gospel was written 
in Aramaic, there is not less difference of opinion than on 
the question of unity of authorship. The “Gospel of the 
Hebrews,” a gospel resembling our Matthew, was in use 
among the Judaizing Christians, and it is held by some 
that this circumstance early gave rise to the erroneous sup- 
position that the Greek Gospel is a translation from the 
Hebrew.! The verbal coincidences between our Matthew 


! A few words may be said here upon the relation of the Gospel aceord- 
ing to the Hebrews to our Matthew. There are traces of the use of that 
Gospel, in somewhat varying forms, among the Judaic or Ebionite Chris- 
tians of Palestine, from the end of the second century to the beginning 
of the fifth. It was ascribed by them to Matthew. It was known to 
Jerome, and was translated by him into Greek and Latin (de vir. illustr. 
6. 2). This fact of itself proves that there must have been differences 
between that Gospel and the canonical Matthew. Of the character of 
these differences (which co-existed witha general similarity), we are 
enabled to judge by the citations from it in the Fathers. For these, see 
Hilgenfeld, Nov. Test. extra canonem receptum, Fasc. iv., pp. 5-38. The 
later and apocryphal origin of these passages in which the Gospel of the 
Hebrews deviates from our Matthew, is obvious. Cf. Mangold, in Bleek’s 
Eiinl. ind. N. T., p. 132 n., and Essays on the Sup. Origin of Ohrist., pp, 
167, 168, 195. Jerome appears at first to have shared in what he states 
to have been the common opinion that the Gospel of the Hebrews was 
the Hebrew original of our Matthew. This is the most probable inter- 
pretation of Jerome, although Meyer (£v. Mati., Hinl., p. 18) seeks to 
prove that he refers to two separate books, one of which he transcribed, 
and the other he translated. The Gospel according to the Twelve Apostles, 
not improbably the Gospel of the Egyptians, and possibly the Gospel of 
Peter, were the same Gospel of the Hebrews with variations of content. 
For the facts and references on the subject of this note, see Mangold’s 
ed. of Bleek, pp. 127 seq., 372 seq., Reuss, Gesch. αἰ. heilig. Schrift. d. N. 
T., 198 seq., Hilgenfeld, Finl. ind. N. T., p. 40 seq. But the hypothe- 
sis that the uncanonical passages in Justin are from the Gospel to the 
Hebrews is quite precarious; and the theory that both Justin and the 


282 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


and the other Synoptists require us to assume, either that 
the first Gospel was written at the outset in the language in 
which we have it, or that, in the process of rendering it into 
the Greek, it was accommodated verbally, to the extent to 
which verbal correspondences exist, to the Greek tradition 
already established. “The parts of the Aramaic oral 
Gospel,” says Professor Westcott, “which were adopted 
by St. Matthew, already existed in the Greek counterpart. 
The change was not so much a revision as a substitution.” 
Yet such a revision of the Greek oral Gospel as would 
exactly answer to Matthew’s revision of the Aramaic, may, 
perhaps, not have been committed to writing till the time 
of the destruction of Jerusalem, when the Hebrew and 
Greek Christians ceased to be in close connection. Then, 
Professor Westcott holds, the Greek Gospel was written, 
“not indeed as a translation, but as a representation of the 
original, as a Greek oral counterpart was already current,” 


author of the Clementine Homilies drew from the Gospel of Peter will 
not bear examination. It is not sustained by a fair comparison of the 
citations in the two books. The instances of verbal coincidence—so far 
as such exist between Justin’s references and those of the Clementines— 
are quite inadequate to prove a common source distinct from the canoni- 
cal Gospels. Justin refers to the homiletic use of the Gospel Memoirs: 
they were read in the churches, in city and country. But this was true, 
as far as can be ascertained, only of the Four Gospels of the Canon; ex- 
cept that the Gospel of the Hebrews was read in the Ebionitic commu- 
nities. Justin’s variations from the text in his quotations are not pecu- 
liar to him; other and later Fathers exhibit the same sort of inaccuracy. 
Justin quotes other writers with quite as much freedom as to the verbal 
form: see, e. g., Apol., i. 10. He quotes the same passages in different 
forms himself. The Author of “Supernatural Religion ” refers to Jus- 
tin’s citation of Matt. xi. 27, and to his use of the aorist for the present 
(“knew” for “ knoweth”). The inference is that the passage was drawn 
from an heretical Gospel. But Justin (Dial., 100) again cites the pas- 
sage, giving the verb in the present, showing that he was in the habit of 
quoting from memory, and frequently without any apparent attempt te 
cite the text verbatim. 
1 Introduction to the Gospels, p. 231, n. 


THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW. 283 


Such additional notes as Matt. xxviii. 15, may have been 
added at this time. 

3. The uncertainty as to the language in which the First 
Gospel was originally written, and difficulties attending 
the supposition that Matthew wrote it in its present form, 
do not preclude a safe judgment respecting the antiquity 
and credibility of the Gospel as it stands. The Greek 
Matthew of the canon has pervading characteristics of 
style. To mention one peculiarity,—the “kingdom of hea- 
ven” is a phrase which occurs thirty-two times in this Gos- 
pel, and occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. There 
is a long list of words which either occur in Matthew alone 
among the Synoptists, or occur so frequently in Matthew, 
as to form a distinctive peculiarity of this Gospel. ὦ 

Now the Greek Matthew of our Bibles was in the hands 
of Papias and his contemporaries. He does not say that 
every one interprets the Hebrew Logia as he can, but, 
“every one interpreted (ἡρμήνευσε) it as he could.” The 
aorist shows incontestably that he speaks of a necessity 
that had once existed, but existed no longer. There is in- 
ternal evidence, to which we shall advert on a subsequent 
page, which proves that the First Gospel, as we have it, 
existed as early as the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus. 
There is nothing to militate against this conclusion, in the 
testimony of Papias, nor in anything to be found in the 
early Fathers. It is quoted asa sacred Scripture by the 
author of the Epistle of Barnabas.?_ It is a safe conclusion 
that the Apostle Matthew had such a relation to this Gospel 
as naturally caused his name to be uniformly connected 
with it in the ecclesiastical tradition as its author.* 

1See Holtzmann, p. 292 seq., for other characteristics of the style of 
the First Gospel; and Westcott, p. 360 n. 
? Hilgenfeld places the date of this Epistle as early as A.D. 97. 


E’inl. in d. N. T., p. 38. 
3 The relative place of the First Gospel, as an authority for the Life 


284 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


On a review of the whole subject, we cannot doubt that 
the first Three Gospels sprang both from oral and written 
sources. It is altogether probable that memoranda would 
be very early made of particular events, or groups of events, 
in the life of Jesus. They would not only be related 
orally, but would also be put in writing. The same is 
true of the discourses of Christ. It seems probable that 
these earliest records were of Galilean origin. The next 
step would be the combination of such distinct memo- 
randa, together with additional matter derived orally, in 
connected narratives. In this process the matter was 
massed, so to speak, under the three heads, the Saviour’s 
Baptism and Temptation, His labors in Galilee, and His 
experiences at Jerusalem. To these essays in the compo- 
sition of gospels, Luke refers (Luke i. 1, 2). Before he 
wrote, many had undertaken the same task. Their mate- 
rials were the oral and written testimony of the immediate 
witnesses of the ministry of Jesus. The efforts of those 
previous authors had been to bring these materials into 
orderly arrangement. He sets about the same work, and 
adverts to the advantages which he had for successfully 
accomplishing it. There is reason to believe that Mark’s 
gospel, being of earlier date, was one of the prior gos- 
pels which Luke speaks of; and, since the testimony of 
Papias acquaints us with the fact that Mark was a hearer 


of Jesus, depends upon the view taken as to the agency of Matthew in 
its composition. Those who, with Ellicott (Life of Christ, p. 150 n. 2), 
ascribe the Gospel in its present amplified Greek form to the Evangelist, 
would naturally place it in the same category with the Fourth Gospel. 
A somewhat different estimate would result from Prof. Westcott’s opinion 
(Intr. to the Gospels, p. 231 n.) that ‘by whose hand the Greek Gospel 
was drawn up is wholly unknown.” By writers like Neander (Leben 
Jesu, pp. 10, 178, 179), and Pressensé (Jésus-Christ, sa Vie, son Temps, 
ete., p. 197 seq.), who hold that the original work of Matthew was of a 
more limited compass, our First Gospel is placed on a level with the 
Gospels of Mark and Luke. 


THH GOSPELS OF MARK AND MATTHEW. 285 


of Peter, a Gospel composed under such advantages would 
naturally be used by Luke much more than other docu- 
ments not possessed of an equal claim to attention. It is 
certainly not improbable that a collection of discourses of 
Jesus, accompanied by brief explanatory matter of a narra- 
tive cast, was early composed ; and it may be that the 
Gospel of Matthew in its present form is the result of an 
amplification of this original document. In this case, it 
is a question not easy to be determined, whether the primi- 
tive Matthew, or the First Gospel in its existing form, was 
used by Luke, in addition to the other sources of informa- 
tion as to the discourses of Christ, which were at his com- 
mand, 

That we have in the Gospels of Matthew and Mark— 
we shall speak more in particular of the other Gospels 
hereafter—a picture of the life, teachings, and miracles of 
Jesus, such as the immediate disciples of the Master were 
in the habit of presenting to their converts, is the fair de- 
duction of a sound and searching historical criticism. 


286 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER IX. 
THE WRITINGS OF LUKE. 


Our New Testament canon contains two books, the 
Third Gospel, and the Acts of the Apostles, which are 
attributed by Irenzeus, Clement of Alexandria, and other 
writers in the latter part of the second century, and by 
Origen, Tertullian, and their contemporaries, to Luke, a 
companion of Paul. None of the Fathers imply that any 
doubt or dispute respecting the authorship of these wri- 
tings had ever existed, from the day of their first appear- 
ance. Their testimony is a witness to the tradition re- 
ceived by the universal church in the closing part of the 
second century. 


The Apostle Paul makes mention of an associate bear- 
ing the name of Luke. In the Epistle to Philemon, 
he sends a greeting from him, and styles him one of his 
fellow-laborers (vs. 24). Luke is referred to again in the 
Epistle to the Colossians (iv. 14), as “the beloved physi- 
cian ;” and the context indicates that he was of Gentile 
birth. Once more, in the Second Epistle to Timothy, he 
is spoken of as the only companion of Paul at that time 
(iv. 11). Justin Martyr does not mention the Evangelists 
by name in his extant writings; nor from the drift and 
design of these writings would he naturally be led to do so. 
It is manifest, however, from his quotations,’ that the 


See e. g. Apol. i. 33; Dial c. Tryph., 105, cf. Luke xxiii. 46; Ibid. 
c. 103, cf. Luke xxii, 44. 


THE GOSPEL OF LUKE. 287 


Third Gospel was among the “ Memoirs,” written by the 
“ Apostles and their Followers,” from which he drew his 
knowledge of the evangelical history. But we are pro- 
vided with an indirect testimony, in the first half of the 
second century, of a conclusive character. Marcion was 
the leader of a Gnostic party, which, in its one-sided zeal 
for Paul and his doctrine, and in its earnest, but incom- 
plete, view of the divine compassion revealed in the Gos- 
pel, discarded the Old Testament, and rejected the other 
Apostles, He came from Pontus, in Asia Minor, to Rome 
about A. D. 140. He made use of a Gospel which the 
Fathers with one voice declare to have been a mutilated 
Luke,—his design having been to expunge in the Third 
Gospel, which he accepted as coming from a companion 
of Paul, passages which recognize the Old Testament sys- 
tem. Of the priority of the canonical Luke there was 
formerly no doubt. There are few critics even of the 
Rationalistic schools who differ on this point from the ge- 
neral opinion. The arguments on which this conviction 
rests are irrefutable. Through the quotations of Tertul- 
lian and Epiphanius, we are enabled to compare Marcion’s 
Luke with the Luke of the canon. Marcion’s Gospel is 
found to include nothing in the way of discourse or narra- 
tive which is not contained in the Gospel of the canon. 
The deviations of Marcion are just of the nature which we 
should expect from the motive ascribed to him. If he 
does not carry out his expurgations with perfect con- 
sistency and success, this fact affords no room for surprise, 
and no good occasion for doubt as to his purpose. More- 
over, the Third Gospel is marked by certain definite pecu- 
liarities of style. The writer has a vocabulary of his own 
—favorite words, and collocations of words. These cha- 
racteristics are found to the full extent in the parts of the 
canonical Gospel not contained in Marcion. These are 


288 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


plainly of a piece with the other portions of the canoni- 
cal Luke. It is impossible that these peculiarities of style, 
which are detected only by close observation, could have 
been imitated. We are justified, therefore, in concluding 
with all confidence that the Gospel of the canon was not 
the result of an amplification of Marcion’s document, but 
that Marcion’s document sprang, as the Fathers assert, from 
a curtailment of the Gospel.’ This inference is not with- 
out the strongest corroboration in the probabilities of the 
case. Who will believe that the Church in the second 
century took up the Gospel of an heretical sect, and made 
it the basis of one of its own authoritative Scriptures ? 
The only reasonable hypothesis is that the canonical Luke 
was already an acknowledged authority in the Church, 
when Marcion constructed his system. He took a known 
and recognized Gospel, received by the Church as the work 
of Luke, a companion of Paul, and endeavored to shape it 
to suit his own ideas of the Pauline system. But there is 
another point still in the argument. Marcion’s Gospel, 
beside the arbitrary alterations which make up, for the most 
part, his divergences from corresponding passages in Luke, 
shows that he occasionally followed another text. The 
manuscript on which he performed his work had readings 
peculiar to itself, as distinguished from existing codices. 
The evidence is such as to make it clear that manuscripts 
of the Third Gospel had so far multiplied that different 
readings, and readings of a peculiar type, had come to 
exist. 5 We do not know how old Marcion was when he 
came to Rome, and made himself conspicuous there. But 
he must have been born near the beginning of the second 
century. We cannot account for the phenomena connected 
with Marcion’s Gospel, without supposing the canonical 


1 See Mr. Sanday’s Gospels in the Second Century, ch. viii. 
2 See Mr. Sanday, Ibid. 


THE GOSPEL OF LUKE. 289 


Gospel, on which it was based, to have been in general 
circulation in the first quarter of the second century, and 
received by the churches as the production of the “ fellow- 
laborer” of Paul. This carries us back within the life-time 
of many of the contemporaries of Luke, and satisfies every 
reasonable requirement as regards external evidence. 

We turn now to the contents of the two works which 
the ancient Church, without contradiction, attributed to 
this writer. 

First, they were written, both of them, by the same 
author. The book of Acts opens with a reference to the 
Gospel, and is addressed to the same Theophilus for whom 
the Gospel was primarily written. But our proposition does 
not rest upon the unsupported assertion of the writer. That 
both books emanated from the same hand is now a univer- 
sally, or almost universally, admitted inference from the 
peculiarities of style to which we have already adverted. 
They extend so far, that—since it is impossible otherwise 
to account for them, by supposing, for example, that they 
were artificially introduced into either of the two books— 
their common origin is a necessary deduction. 

Secondly, the author of the Gospel professes to have de- 
rived his information at first hand from those who wit- 
nessed and participated in the events to be described. 
Many “had taken in hand”—the term denotes the writer’s 
sense of the seriousness and difficulty of the task—to write 
the evangelical history. The facts, in the belief of which 
he and his fellow-Christians were established, had been de- 
livered to him and them by the Apostles and other im- 
mediate disciples of the Lord,—for this is the meaning of 
his language. He had learned these facts orally, or, it 
might be, in part, from writings ; but he distinguishes his 
sources of knowledge from the class of works which many, 
situated like himself as not being immediate witnesses, had 


19 


290 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


composed. He had taken pains to trace back the history 
to the very first—that is to the birth of Christ, and of 
John the Baptist, instead of going only to “ the begin- 
ning,” the commencement of the public ministry of Jesus. 
He proposed to make a consecutive narrative in order that 
Theophilus might know the unassailable certainty, or 
reality, of the faith in which he had been instructed. So 
far, then, as a plain, deliberate, simple asseveration goes, 
we have proof that the Third Gospel proceeds from the pen 
of a contemporary of the first disciples, and that he derived 
its contents from them.’ 

Thirdly, the author of these books was imbued with the 
characteristic principles of Paul. That type of theology, 
that mode of regarding Christ and His salvation, belongs 
to the writer of the Third Gospel, and of the Acts. His 
tone and spirit are what we should expect in one who had 
listened with sympathy to the teaching of the Apostle to 
the Gentiles. This position is universally allowed ; hence 
there is no need of argument in support of it. 

Fourthly, the author discovers himself to have been a 
companion of Paul; and he does this in a way to remove all 


1 Professor Holtzmann (Zeitschr. f. wissenschaftl. Theol., xxi. i. p. 85 
seq.), has endeavored to show that Luke made use of the writings of 
Josephus. But his arguments, founded largely on certain verbal re- 
semblances, lack force. Because Luke says—xpdricte Θεόφιλε, and 
Josephus—Kpariote "Exagpéddire, the inference that the one writer was ac- 
quainted with the other is about as well founded as the conclusion would 
be that one author copied from another, because both begin with “ Dear 
Sir.” That Luke did not use Josephus is satisfactorily proved by Pro- 
fessor Schiirer (Zeitschr. f. wiss. Theol., 1876, pp. 574-582). Dr. Schiirer 
says: “ Entweder hat Lucas yon Josephus keine Notiz genommen, oder 
er hat nachtriglich von seiner Lectiire wiederum Alles vergessen. Die 
erstere Annahme als die einfachere scheint mir den Vorzug zu yerdie- 
nen” (p. 582). Critics who would convict Luke of inaccuracies by 
appealing to Josephus should not make Josephus the source of his 
materials. 


THE WRITINGS OF LUKE. 291 


reasonable doubt of the fact. The narrative in the Acts 
moves on as we should expect of a historian who has de- 
rived his information from oral and written sources, until 
the Apostle Paul arrives at Troas (xvi. 10), when there is 
a sudden transition to the first person plural—“ immediately 
we endeavored to go into Macedonia.” The narrator, if 
we follow this pronominal clue, was in the company of 
Paul as far as Philippi. Here he was left behind, during 
the rest of the Apostle’s second missionary journey. But 
he joins Paul again, apparently at Philippi (Acts xx. 5), 
and continues with him to the end of the history, when 
Paul has reached Rome. These passages of the Acts are 
stamped with the minute and graphic touches that show 
the narrator to have been an eye-witness. The account of 
Paul’s voyage and shipwreck, for example, is so full and 
so exact in its details, that it must have come from one 
who was with him. If this companion was not the author 
of the book, then its author took up, without advertising 
his readers of the fact, a document emanating from some 
other person who was with Paul, and who made a record 
of what occurred. But these passages are homogeneous in 
style with the rest of the book; they exhibit the literary 
characteristics which are found elsewhere in the Third Gos- 
pel and in the Acts. The hypothesis that a document is in- 
corporated which was composed by another, is precluded, 
unless it is held that the pronoun “ we” was retained on pur- 
pose to deceive the reader into the persuasion that it was the 
author of the book who attended Paul, and that he is relating 
what he saw himself. ‘This theory is actually adopted by 
certain critics, of whom Zeller is one. They are driven to 
the alternative of admitting that the author of the book was 
with Paul, or is guilty of a trick of the sort described. But 
what a character does their notion attribute to the writer of 
Acts! How expert in knavery he must have been, to 


292 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


re-write a document of this nature, in order to assimilate 
it to his own style, while taking care to leave this pro- 
nominal feature, to stand as an artless indication of personal 
presence! Would not a man of this character have made 
his pretended association with Paul more conspicuous? 
Would he have left it merely to be inferred by the obser- 
vant reader? The hypothesis of Zeller is repugnant to a 
sound critical, as well as a healthy moral, feeling. The 
circumstance that Luke does not expressly mention the fact 
of his joining Paul at Troas, unexpected, at first sight, as 
that circumstance is, is much more easily explained than 
would be the silent introduction of a fragment from another 
hand, re-composed, as it must have been, if this hypothesis 
is admitted. The book of Acts was written for an ac- 
quaintance, or friend, Theophilus, to whom Luke’s relations 
to Paul were known, and who was quite probably ac- 
quainted with the fact that Luke joined the Apostle on the 
occasion of his passing into Europe.” There was no oc- 
casion, or certainly much less occasion, for an explicit decla- 
ration to this effect, than if the narrative had been primarily 
drawn up for strangers, for the public generally. What- 
ever may be thought as to the sufficiency of this explanation 
of Luke’s omission to state definitely that here at Troas he 
joined Paul, it is a thousand times more natural and 
rational to regard his silence as the result of an artless neg- 
lect, than to impute it to the profound calculation of a 
mendacious writer, intent upon a pious fraud. 

There is no work of classical antiquity whose genuine- 
ness would be doubted for a moment, if it were sustained 
by evidence equal in amount to that which we have pre- 


1 “Car admettre que cet ἡμεῖς vienne d’un document inséré par |’au- 
teur dans sa narration est souverainement inyraisemblable.” Renan, 
Les Evangiles, p. 436,n. 2. 


? See Meyer, Apostelgesch., Hinl. p. 5. 


THE WRITINGS OF LUKE. 293 


sented in behalf of Luke. That Eusebius quotes from 
Papias anecdotes pertaining to the composition of the Gos- 
pels of Matthew and Mark, affords not a shadow of proof 
that this Father was not acquainted with Luke. The 
motive that guided Eusebius in these references and cita- 
tions is declared by himself; and both from his own pro- 
fessions, and from his practice in regard to authors who are 
extant, it is certain that it was no part of his intention to 
mention all of the canonical books that Papias and the 
other fathers, to whom he alludes under this head, used. 
The testimony of the ecclesiastical writers of the second 
century, so far as they have any occasion to refer to the sub- 
ject, is unanimous. We have the great fact of the adop- 
tion of these two books by the Church, although they 
sprang from a non-apostolic writer. And the internal evi- 
dence of authorship is of the most conclusive character. 

There is no writer of the New Testament who affords so 
abundant means of testing his knowledge and accuracy as 
Luke. An author not well informed, writing long after 
the events, would not be able to save himself from num- 
berless anachronisms in the composition of a book like the 
Acts. The effect of investigation has been to vindicate. the 
accuracy of Luke in a multitude of particulars; and if in 
a few points there are difficulties of chronology which 
have not been solved, it is acase where the exception proves 
the rule. 

In recent times, Baur, Zeller, Hilgenfeld, and the other 
members of the so-called Tiibingen school, have impeached 
the truthfulness of the author of the Third Gospel and of 
the Acts, on the ground of alleged perversions of history 
on his part. Sometimes it is held that earlier works were 
recast, and amplified, by a later writer from whom the 
books in their existing form emanate. It is not requisite 


1 See Prof. Lightfoot’s Art., Cont. Review, Jan., 1875. 


294 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


to enumerate here the various hypotheses, or guesses, 
which have been propounded on this branch of the sub- 
ject. The points on which these critics agree are that the 
author of the Third Gospel and of the Acts took un- 
warranted liberties with historical facts in order to give 
a strong Pauline coloring to the life and teachings of 
Jesus, and in order to make it appear that the Apos- 
tle to the Gentiles was not at variance with the other 
Apostles and with the body of Jewish Christians. The 
assumption at the basis of this criticism, and of this 
attack upon Luke, is that Peter and Paul, with their 
respective followers, were in direct antagonism as to the 
obligations of the Gentile believers to submit to circum- 
cision and to the Mosaic ritual generally ; an assump- 
tion which is shown to be false by the explicit testimony 
of Paul himself.' That Luke was a disciple of Paul, and 
that as such, and as being himself of Gentile birth, he was 
interested in what may be termed the universal features of 
the Gospel, as it was taught by Jesus; and that this cir- 
cumstance affected his selection of matter, and to some ex- 
tent, the tone of his narrative, is conceded. The question 
is whether his position and feeling led him to suppress, 
distort, and invent facts, in order to make a false impres- 
sion respecting the evangelical history. It is evident, also, 
that, in the Acts, he is interested in tracing the method by 
which the Gospel was opened to the Gentile world. This, in 
truth, is the main thread that links together his narrative; 
and, probably more than any other consideration, deter- 
mined him in choosing what events to describe and what 
to omit. But the question here is whether he was a wilful 
falsifier, or not. He can be convicted of being this, only 
by the most arbitrary and inconsistent criticism. We may 
do full justice to the learning, industry, and acuteness of 


1 Gal. ii. 9. 


THE GOSPEL OF LUKE. 295 


Zeller and of others who have assailed the credibility of 
Luke, while, at the same time, we assert what we believe 
will be the verdict of competent and unbiased judges,— 
that their impeachment of Luke, and their exegesis in sup- 
port of it, rest upon groundless, gratuitous suspicion, such 
as, in the ordinary concerns of life, is habitually repelled 
by a healthy moral nature. A morbid judgment discerns 
cunning, fraud, and far-seeing calculation, where there is 
nothing but simplicity and uncalculating honesty. Passages 
that disprove the Tiibingen indictment are lightly passed 
over, or subjected to a forced explanation which robs them 
of their natural meaning. 

A few illustrations of this kind of criticism in its appli- 
cation to the Third Gospel, must be presented. They are 
mostly taken from a recent publication, Hilgenfeld’s “ In- 
troduction to the New Testament.”! Matthew (viii. 5-13) 
gives an account of the healing of the Roman Centurion’s 
son, and of Christ’s commendation of the Centurion’s 
faith. This passage as found in Matthew perplexes the 
Tiibingen school of critics, who are not prepared for such 
a narrative in the Judeo-Christian Gospel. But Luke, in 
the parallel passage (vii. 1-10), who would be expected, 
according to the system of the critics, to make the most of 
the remarkable favor shown by Jesus to a Gentile, on the 
contrary makes the Centurion’s request to have been con- 
veyed by the elders of the Jews, who praise him as worthy; 
“for,” they say, “he loveth our nation and hath built us 
a synagogue.” That is, they found their request on what 
he had done for the Jews. Hilgenfeld is obliged to say 
that the Evangelist has given the narrative a Judaistic 
shape (“ judaistischer gestaltet ”), and made of the Centurion 
a kind of Jewish proselyte. One would think that such 


1 Historisch-kritische Einl. in d. N. T., von Dr. Adolf Hilgenfeld 
(Leipzig, 1875). 


296 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


a proceeding would tend to shake the confidence of the 
critic in his theory about the covert purpose of Juuke to 
give exaggerated emphasis to everything favorable to the 
Gentiles, and to add to this element out of his own inyven- 
tion. But no; Hilgenfeld is equal to the emergency. 
Luke could not make use of the Centurion “as a mere 
heathen,” “ because he reserved the decided overstepping 
of the Jewish activity of Jesus for the mission of the seventy 
(x. 1 seq).”1 There was an artistic motive; the writer 
must wait for what he thought a better occasion for bring- 
ing Jesus forward in this new field. Apart from the 
question how this trick of the Evangelist was revealed 
to the mind of Hilgenfeld, how strange the supposi- 
tion is that Luke should have felt it necessary to throw 
away a fact in the life of Jesus, which must have harmo- 
nized exactly with his wishes and ideas, simply for the 
reason that he was intending to record another fact of the 
same general tenor, even if it were of more important sig- 
nificance. ~But let us look at the mission of the Seventy. 
This, we are assured, Luke invented, in order to introduce 
a ministry of Jesus, through them, outside of Jewish 
limits ; the number seventy being pitched upon as repre- 
senting the heathen nations enumerated in Genesis (c.x.).? 
But the number, in all probability, was fixed upon by Jesus, 
on account of the seventy elders, the assistants of Moses, 
and with no reference whatever to the heathen. Nor is 
there the least intimation by the Evangelist that the seventy 
went to a non-Jewish population. Thus the reason assigned 
for the inconvenient cast given by Luke to the incident 
connected with the Centurion—a very flimsy reason at best 
—is despoiled of its frail foundation. Luke leaves out the 
severe rebuke of Peter—“Get thee behind me, Satan ”— 
recorded by Matthew and Mark. This would be most 


1 Hilgenfeld, p. 559. 2 Thid., p. 562. 


THE GOSPEL OF LUKE. 297 


remarkable if his purpose were to exhibit the twelve in an 
unfavorable light, as is alleged. Hilgenfeld has no better 
explanation of this omission than to attribute it to Luke’s 
wish to record “at once” the words of Jesus relative to 
following Him (Luke ix. 28.) But why should he be in 
a hurry to give these words “at once?” Why a needless 
haste that requires him to throw away one of the choicest 
weapons in his armory? Luke presents in the passage 
from ix. 51 to xviii. 5, what the Germans call the “ Great 
Intercalation,” which contains much matter not found in 
the other Evangelists. Here occur the Parable of the Good 
Samaritan, the Parables of the Prodigal Son, the Lost Piece 
of Money, and the Lost Sheep, and the Story of the 
Pharisee and Publican. These pearls in the evangelical 
teaching, which are stamped with indubitable marks of 
genuineness, are objects of suspicion to the Tiibingen 
critics. They are brought forward by Luke, we are told, 
to give support to his more catholic, or Pauline ideas, 
_ which he would carry back into the teaching of Jesus. 
Hilgenfeld makes the parables in the xvth of Luke refer 
to the heathen as contrasted with the Jews ;? whereas it is 
explicitly stated that it was with reference to “ publicans 
and sinners” that they were uttered. Their broader appli- 
cation is legitimate, but such is not their direct meaning 
and intent. The existence of this “ Great Intercalation” is 
a proof that Luke had access to. the primitive sources of 
information. It is a strong argument for the genuineness 
of the Third Gospel. Hilgenfeld would discredit the 
statements respecting Martha and Mary (x. 38-42).2 He 
first imputes to the Evangelist the design to set the Jews, 
represented by Martha, in contrast with the Gentiles repre- 
sented by Mary; but this allegorical intent exists only in 
the critic’s imagination. When Hilgenfeld comes to the 


1 Tbid., p. 561. 2 Tbid., pp. 565, 572. 8 Ibid., p. 563. 


298 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


promise to the twelve (Luke xxii. 30), that they shall sit 
on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel, he can find 
no other consolation for the distinction put upon the origi- 
nal Disciples, so opposed to the critic’s theory of the pur- 
pose of Luke, than the reflection—which is contrary to the 
real purport of the passage—that they have only the 
promise of judging the Jews.' The plain truth is, that the 
assailants of Luke can scarcely take a step without stum- 
bling upon something which overturns their position. One 
of their main charges is, that he is “antinomian ;” that 
is, averse to the Mosaic law. But they are obliged to 
confront such a passage as this (xvi. 17): “It is easier 
for heaven and earth to pass away than one tittle 
of the law to fail;’ and they are driven to substitute 
for “law” the altered text of Marcion, which is destitute 
of manuscript authority, and is evidently one of his 
arbitrary changes. But the passage does not stand alone. 
As Professor Holtzmann observes: “The notion of the 
νόμος occurs even oftener in Luke than in Matthew ; 
and the Evangelist in whom it never appears under this 
name is not Luke, but Mark; and so passages like Luke 
v. 14, x. 25-28, xvii. 14, xviii. 18-20 are no longer to be 
called mere exceptions.” The conclusion of Professor 
Holtzmann, whose work on the Synoptic Gospels is one of 
the most thorough products of German learning, and who 
is very far from being biased by traditional opinion, is thus 
expressed : “ The Pauline stand-point of Luke conditions, 
to be sure, the selection and presentation of the matter ; 
here and there, also, the verbal expression of the trans- 
mitted Discourses, yet not so as if a subjective ‘ tendency ἢ 
usurped the place of an objective view of the historical 
truth.” * Every historian who is a man of feeling, will have 
a lively interest in certain aspects of his subject, and this 


1[bid., p. 573. ? Die Synopt. Evangelien, p. 398. —? Ibid., 394. 


THE BOOK OF ACTS. 299 


will appear, and may properly appear in his narrative. 
Such a peculiarity is at a world-wide remove from falsifica- 
tion, whether conscious, or the effect of partisan excitement. 


The main force of the critical attack upon Luke has 
been directed against the book of Acts. Here, if we are to 
believe Baur and Zeller, is a systematic perversion of the 
facts of the Apostolical history, and, also, the deliberate 
addition of narrative matter without foundation in truth. 
The motive ascribed to the writer, who composed this book 
not earlier than the beginning of the second century, is to 
pacify the strife between the Petrine or Jewish Christians, 
and the adherents of the liberal theology of Paul. To 
this end he makes Paul concede what this Apostle in 
fact steadfastly refused to allow to the Jewish side, and, in 
turn, attributes to Peter liberal professions and practices 
which are equally without warrant in the actual history. 
All pains are taken to represent Paul as having stood in a 
friendly relation to the older Apostles and to the Jewish 
Christians, which, we are assured, was not at all the case. 
The Tiibingen critics start with a certain theory as to the 
real state of things in the Apostolic age, which they pro- 
fess to extract from the Pauline Epistles, or such of them 
as they admit to be genuine; and by this conception as a 
touchstone, they test the narratives in the Acts, sifting 
them and recasting them as the exigencies of their theory 
may dictate. Upon the correctness of this preconceived 
idea, which is adopted as a criterion of judgment, the value 
of their whole procedure depends. 

It is of course impossible, in this place, to follow the 
critics in question through the entire book of Acts, and 
examine every point which bears on the credibility of the 
author. It is practicable, however, to test the correctness 
of their premises, and to look at their treatment of certain 


300 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


passages of prime importance, by which the tenableness of 
their position can be fairly determined. 

Luke’s account of the Apostolic Council, in the xvth 
chapter, is the passage that is specially entitled to atten- 
tion, since it is here, as we are told, that the peculiar “ ten- 
dency ἡ of Luke is most palpably disclosed, and his viola- 
tions of historical truth most apparent. The Tubingen 
critics do not scruple to declare that no such Council was 
held, no such concession made to the Gentiles by Peter, 
James, and John, and, on the contrary, that no such re- 
quirements were laid by them, with Paul’s assent, upon the 
Gentile believers. The original Apostles were too strong 
Judaizers, Paul was too radical in the opposite direction, 
for us to suppose that either party would have consented 
to such an arrangement. 

The first thing to be said in reply to these propositions 
is, that the main assertion of the negative criticism re- 
specting the position of the three Apostles on the great 
question of the relation of the Gentile believers to the 
Mosaic Law, is demonstrably false. The Apostle Paul, in 
the second chapter of Galatians, referring to this very visit 
to Jerusalem during which the Council took place, declares 
that the Apostles had no amendment to propose to his 
preaching, but gave him the right hand of fellowship. ? 
The three Apostles did not ask, or expect, that the Gen- 
tile converts should be circumcised. They gave him the 
hand of fellowship, although at that very time he refused 
to comply with the demand of Judaizers that Titus, his 
companion, a heathen convert, should receive circumcision. 
Paul’s own statement, therefore, sweeps away the founda- 
tion of the Tiibingen theory.” 


1 Gal. ii. 9. 
? The Author of “Supernatural Religion,” who reproduces the doc- 
trines and arguments of the Tiibingen school, says (vol. iii. p, 281): 


THE BOOK OF ACTS. 901 


To call in question the sincerity of this act of fellowship 
would involve the greatest reproach against both parties, 
the Three Apostles on the one side, and Paul and Barnabas 
on the other. Had the recognition of him not been real 
and cordial, Paul’s reference to it, in writing to the Gala- 
tians, must be considered intentionally misleading. Finally, 
the arrangement for the collection of alms for the poor 
brethren at Jerusalem proves incontestably that there was 
‘mutual confidence and good feeling.! 

There are two principal arguments brought against the 
credibility of Luke’s narrative of the Council. The first is 
from the silence of the Apostle Paul respecting the Decree 
or Recommendation of the Council, in the Epistles to the 
Galatians and Corinthians, where the same, or cognate 
questions, are handled. Let us look, in the first place, at 
the Epistle to the Galatians. What was the difficulty in 
that Church? Judaizers were demanding that the Gala- 
tian Christians should be circumcised, and they were call- 
ing in question the apostolic authority of Paul, he not 
having been one of the twelve. These were the two points 
“Tt will be observed that, after saying that they ‘communicated no- 
thing’ to him, the Apostle adds, in opposition, ‘ but, on the contrary,’ 
(ἀλλὰ τοὐναντίον). In what does this opposition consist? Apparently 
in this, that, instead of strengthening the hands of Paul, they left him 
to labor alone.” But what Paul says is: “On the contrary ... gave 
to me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship.” The sense is: ‘they 
found nothing to supply or correct in my teaching, but, on the contrary, 
gave me a pledge of friendship and fidelity.’ The author of “Super- 
natural Religion” here adopts a flagrant misinterpretation, equal to 
the worst which he finds in the class of writers whom he is fond of stig- 
matizing as ‘‘ Apologists.” 

1 Gal. ii. 10. The author of “ Supernatural Religion ” (iii. 312) does 
“not think it worth while to refer” to this consideration, since “charity 
is not a mere matter of doctrine, and the Good Samaritan does not put a 
sufferer through the catechism.” This will not do. Who can believe 


that the Three Apostles asked alms, for themselves or their brethren, of 
one whom they considered a heretic and perverter of the Gospel ? 


902 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


on which they were making trouble: the Galatians must 
be circumcised, and Paul was either no Apostle, or subor- 
dinate to the older Disciples. Now Paul says just what 
he would be expected to say, under the circumstances. 
He vindicates his independence as an Apostle, by showing 
just what his relations had been to those who were Apos- 
tles before him; and he meets the other point of the 
Judaizers at the same time, by referring to this identical 
visit to Jerusalem, when the three Apostles sanctioned his 
preaching, and made no claim that the Gentiles should 
submit to the initiatory rite of Judaism.’ It is true that Paul 
refers to his private interview at Jerusalem with the other 
Apostles, but his phraseology implies that there was, also, 
a more public conference ;” and to this private interview he 
would naturally refer, rather than to the public meeting, 
since his relation to the other Apostles in particular was 
the question uppermost in his mind. 

In the other place where the silence of Paul as to the 
Conciliar conclusion is considered by the Tiibingen critics 
inexplicable (1 Cor. viii.), the question respecting the 
eating of meat offered to idols was not raised by Judai- 
zers. It was a subject that was brought before the Apos- 
tle’s mind independently of any controversies about the re- 


1 The auther of “Supernatural Religion” says (vol. iii. p. 269): “15 
it possible that the Apostle would have left totally unmentioned the fact 
that the Apostles and the very Church of Jerusalem had actually de- 
clared circumcision to be unnecessary?” But thisis just what Paul does 
say of the other Apostles, whose authority the Judaizers were attempt- 
ing to array against him. They saw, he says, “that the Gospel of uncir- 
cumcision was committed unto me;” ‘they gave to me and Barnabas 
the right hand of fellowship.” What more explicit could the author of 
‘«Supernatural Religion” demand? 


2 See the comments of Meyer and Lightfoot on Gal. ii. 2. The kar’ 
ἰδίαν δὲ τοῖς δοκοῦσιν is in contrast with the previous αὐτοῖς, which de- 


notes the larger body. How impossible, as Meyer says, that Paul should 
have made no communication except to the Three! 


THE BOOK OF ACTS. 303 


lation of Jewish to Gentile believers. He was not called 
upon, therefore, by the circumstances of the case to make 
any reference to the Conference at Jerusalem. 

It is objected, however, secondly, that the teaching of 
Paul in his Epistles is contradictory to the prescriptions 
of the Council. The more common answer to this objec- 
tion is that the Letter of the Council was addressed to the 
Gentile brethren in Syria, and Cilicia; and that the 
Apostle, after he had extended his work far beyond these 
limits, and planted churches mainly composed of Gentiles, 
did not consider himself at all bound to carry out those 
recommendations. This may possibly be a sufficient an- 
swer to the objection, and solution of the difficulty. Yet 
it is improbable, as we may infer from Acts xxi. 25, as 
well as from the apparent position of James and most of 
the Jewish Christians at the time of the Council, that they 
considered the restrictions to be of so limited application. 
It seems probable that they looked on these restrictions, 
not as dictated by expediency merely, in order that Jews 
might not be scandalized, but as intrinsically proper.’ To 
ascertain what view Paul took on this subject, we must 
scrutinize their purport, and then inquire what was Paul’s 
subsequent teaching as compared with them. From the 
conjunction of the restrictions of marriage as they stand in 
the Mosaic law (Levit. xviii.) with the other prohibitions 
which are reiterated in the Apostolic decree, and from the 
reference to the Balaamites and followers of Jezebel in the 
Apocalypse (Rev. 11. 14, 20), whose offence appears to have 
been a disregard of these enactments, it is certainly probable 
that, by fornication (πορνεία) is meant, or at least prominently 
included, the marriages thus forbidden. The Apostle 
(1 Cor. y. 1) in his reference to one who had taken his 
step-mother to wife, uses this term, having in mind the 


1 See below, p. 482 seq. 


304 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


law in Lev. xviii. 8.’ There is no doubt that Paul in- 
sisted upon the obligation which was expressed in the last 
prohibition of the Council. The first prohibition re- 
lated to meat offered to idols, or slain in the heathen sacri- 
fices. There is reason to believe, partly from the references 
in the Old Testament to practices of this nature, that the 
reference here was to the feasts spread in the heathen 
temples, in which Christians would be tempted to partici- 
pate. This interpretation is favored by Ewald, who con- 
siders the restriction to be “ a command to abstain from all 
idolatrous worship.” ? Reverting now to Paul’s instruction 
to the Corinthians, we shall see that he inculcates this very 
obligation on Christians. * They are not to sit at meat in 
the idol’s temple. With respect to the further question 
about eating in one’s own house, or at a private meal, the 
flesh of an animal which had been offered on a heathen 
altar, and purchased in the market, the Apostle gives a 
qualified answer. The meat is not in reality tainted, or 
polluted ; but if one superstitiously thinks it to be so, I 
ought not, by the force of my example, to lead him to 
violate his conscience, however it may lack enlighten- 
ment, The Apostle discusses the whole subject, as we 
should anticipate that he would, on the broad grounds 
of principle. But the result—the obligation to stay away 
from feasts in idol temples—is identical with what we 
suppose to be the drift and intent of the Conciliar recom- 
mendation. Nothing unfavorable to the historical truth 
of the latter can be drawn, therefore, from any incon- 
sistency on this point in the subsequent teaching of 
Paul. The third restriction of the Council pertained to 


1So Meyer, in loc. The previous husband was probably, in this case, 
still living (2 Cor. vii. 12.) On the term πορνεία in the Apostolic de- 
cree, see Ritschl, p. 129 sq., Lipsius, in Schenkel’s Bibel-Lexicon. 


2 Gesch. d. Volkes Israel, vi. 437. 31 Cor. x. 18-22. 


THE BOOK OF AOTS. 305 


the eating of the blood of animals; for the prohibition of 
blood and of things strangled is virtually one. “ This,” 
says Ewald, “ was agreeable to all the better sentiment of 
antiquity, and was certainly at that time accepted as an 
obligation that no one disputed.” At the same time, as 
Ewald proceeds to say, this ancient view respecting blood 
had its root in a higher thought or association, by no means 
of necessity or inseparably connected with it.2 Here there 
was room for new questions, and further strife. -Ewald sug- 
gests that the neglect of the Gentile converts to take the re- 
quisite precautions in killing their meat, their failure to ob- 
serve this restriction, induced the feeling among the Jewish 
Christians that they could not safely eat with them, and thus 
gave rise to the occurrences at Antioch when Paul rebuked 
Peter for his inconsistency. At all events, the Apostle 
Paul nowhere, in his Epistles, expresses dissent from this 
part of the Conciliar letter. This particular restriction ap- 
pears to have dropped out of sight; since it is not men- 
tioned in the Apocalypse, in the passage which probably 
alludes to the decree of the Council, and affords an addi- 
tional proof of its historical reality. 

Thus, when we compare the xvth of Acts on the one 
hand, with the testimony and teaching of Paul on the 
other, we find no inconsistency between the two. On the 
capital fact of a fraternal recognition of Paul by the older 
Apostles, there is a perfect agreement. He could say that 
they added nothing to his teaching; for he had been ac- 
customed to expect of his heathen converts a fulfillment 
of the duties resting upon a proselyte of the gate. The 

1 Geschichte, vi. 439. 

2 Alterthiimer, p. 41. The first origin of the feeling was in the idea 
of the blood as the life, or soul, of the animal, and as having asort of 
sacredness which precluded it from being a proper article of food for 


man. 
3 Rey. ii. 14. 
20 


306 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


concessions that were made by them were tantamount to a 
distinct admission that the observance of the law was not 
necessary for salvation." The recommendations of the 
Council, Paul was not led by the circumstances under 
which he wrote to the Galatians and the Corinthians, to 
call up; but his teaching, as far as he touches on the topics 
in question, is coincident with them. 

There are certain considerations which strongly corrobo- 
rate Luke’s. narrative of the Council. 

1. The liberality of Peter subsequently in eating with 
the Gentiles at Antioch presupposes previous convictions 
on his part such as are attributed to him by Luke. Had 
he been a stiff Judaizer, the instantaneous sweeping away 
of all barriers between him and the Gentile—such even as 
the decision of the Council left untouched—would be 
utterly inexplicable. 

2. It is altogether unlikely from all that we know of 
James that he and his associates would have been satisfied, 
at the time of the Council, with less than what is contained 
in the prescriptions of the decree. We know from Paul’s 
own testimony that they assured him of their fellowship, 
and bestowed, as it were, their benediction upon his work. 
Did they do this, making no requirements of the Gentile 
converts? Not even requiring the observance of what was 
expected of Proselytes of the Gate? The supposition is in- 


1The Author of ‘ Supernatural Religion” (iii. 268), speaking of the 
stipulation that Paul should remember the poor at Jerusalem, says: 
‘* As one condition is here mentioned, why not the others, had any been 
actually imposed?” The request that the Gentile Christians should 
contribute to the necessities ef the poor at Jerusalem, is not properly 
called ‘‘a condition,” —as if the recognition of Paul and his mission de- 
pended upon it. But there were no other conditions; that is, none which 
went beyond the previous opinions and practices of Paul. The provi- 
sions of the decree were not something “added,” in the sense in which 
he uses the term, 


THE BOOK OF ACTS, 307 


credible. This consideration lends the strongest probability 
to the transaction which Luke records. 

3. No Pauline Christian of the second century, after the 
Gospel had spread far and wide among the heathen, would 
have proposed that the Jewish Christians should continue 
to observe the whole Mosaic law.’ The Church had passed 
beyond concessions of this kind. Yet this is the position 
assigned, throughout the Book of Acts, to James and his 
Apostolic associates. It is nothing different from what we 
might expect of both classes of Christians while the temple 
was still standing, and while the stronghold of Christianity, 
so to speak, was at Jerusalem. To place an understanding 
or arrangement of this kind in the second century is an 
anachronism. 

In the controversy afterwards at Antioch, Peter was not 
accused by Paul of holding Judaizing principles, but rather 
of a temporary desertion of the liberal ground which he 
had occupied before the arrival of the messengers from 
Jerusalem. The conduct of Peter as thus disclosed, there- 
fore, so far from casting discredit upon Luke’s account of 
his behaviour at the Council, corroborates that narrative. 
Let it be observed that the complaint of those who came 
from James—we know not the special errand on which 
they came—was, not that the Antioch converts from the 
heathen side were not circumcised, but that the Jewish 
Christians mingled with them at a common table, paying 
no heed to the restrictions of the law. This was a point 
not expressly touched by the decision of the Council, and 
one on which a difference might easily exist. In other 
words, that decision left a door open for further controversy 
with regard to the kind and degree of intercourse that 
should subsist between the two classes of believers. ? 


‘See Mangold’s remarks, in Bleek’s inl. p. 392. 
? This topic is further considered in Ch. xv. of this work. The Author 


308 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


It may be here remarked that a strong confirmation of 
the fidelity of Luke’s narrative is found in the special 
characteristics and position ascribed respectively to Peter 
and James. Both are Jewish Apostles, and in the main 
coincide ; yet James appears throughout as more conserva- 
tive, more sedulous to prevent the Jewish Christians from 
giving up the distinctive peculiarities of the ritual. 

The refusal of Paul to circumcise Titus at the demand 
of “the false brethren” was not inconsistent with what is 
said of Timothy in Acts xvi. 3. The two cases were not 
parallel. Titus was of Greek parentage on both sides ; 
Timothy’s mother was a Jewess, as Luke expressly states 
(Acts xvi. 1).} The circumcision of Titus was demanded 
by Judaizers, on doctrinal grounds; the circumcision of 
Timothy was an accommodation to the feeling of Jews 
(Acts xvi. 3), that he might have access to the synagogues, 
without having to encounter a hostile prejudice. In the 
circumcision of Timothy, Paul acted, whatever may be 
said to the contrary,” agreeably to his avowed maxim, 
to avoid all offence where no principle was at stake? It 


of “Supernatural Religion” thinks that the proceedings at Antioch 
show that James, and those who were sent by him, held a position op- 
posite to that assigned to them in Luke’s description of the Council. 
But he answers himself when he compares the relation of the Gentile 
Christians to the Jewish, as defined by the Council, to that of ‘‘ Prose- 
lytes of the Gate in relation to Judaism”’ (vol. iii. p. 282). This state- 
ment may be correct so far as it describes th2 views which many Jewish 
Christians took of the bearing of the decree upon the mutual intercourse 
of the two classes of Christians. The Gentile Christians were not recog- 
nized by them as “ in full communion” (Sup. Rel., iii. 283). This was 
the point of dispute at Antioch. But they were recognized as “ fellow- 
heirs” of salvation through Christ. 

1 Notwithstanding Meyer’s comment, it seems probable that the Jews 
who knew the family would think that the rite ought to have been ap- 
plied, and, at the same time—his father being a Greek—knew that this 
had not been done. 


? As by the Author of “Supernatural Religion ” (iii. 301). 
31 Cor. ix. 19-23. 


THE BOOK OF ACTS. 309 


is true that he says: “ Is any called in uncircumcision, let 
him not be circumcised.” ' But a great strain is put upon 
a general declaration of this character, when it is inferred 
that the Apostle could, therefore, never have allowed this 
rite in the case of a missionary helper, whose mother was 
a Jewess, and whose circumcision carried with it no doc- 
trinal significance, but removed a harmful prejudice.” 

The assailants of the credibility of Luke make much of 
an alleged parallelism, according to the Acts, between the 
miracles and experiences of the two Apostles Peter and 
Paul. It can hardly fail, however, to occur to every one 
who reflects, that there must have been striking points of 
resemblance in the events incidental to the career of men 
engaged in the same work, and in the face of similar obsta- 
cles.* There were sick to be healed, blasphemers to be 
chastised ; there would be visions to be received, and im- 
prisonments and deliverances to be experienced, by both. 
Without doubt, thetwo Apostles are the leading personages 
in the narrative. Nor does it justify a suspicion of un- 
truthfulness, if there are found, oreven if the author, in the 
selection of his material, takes pains to present, incidents 
which exhibit such a resemblance. If Peter healed a man 
lame from his birth at the gate of the temple at Jerusalem,‘ 
it is surely not, for this reason, incredible, that at Lystra 
another such cripple should be healed by Paul.2 Because 
Ananias and Sapphira are punished by Peter, 5 why 
should it be thought incredible that Elymas, “the sor- 
cerer,”’ should be smitten with blindness by Paul?’ Be- 
cause Cornelius fell at the feet of Peter, and Peter bade 


11 Cor. vii. 18. 

2 Dr. Lightfoot thinks that Paul, in Gal. ii. 3, is answering an objec- 
tion founded on the known fact of the circumcision of Timothy. See 
Lightfoot’s Galatians, p. 104. 

SCf. Gal. ii. 8. ‘Actsiii.2seq.  ‘5xiv.8seq. ‘v.1seq. 

T xiii. 11 seq. 


310 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


him rise,’ it is a groundless skepticism to doubt the state- 
ment that the people at Lystra would have offered sacrifice 
to Paul and Barnabas.” And what shall be said of the 
suspicion awakened by the circumstance that while Peter 
is ‘scourged by order of the council,® Paul is beaten with 
many stripes at the command of the magistrates of 
Philippi?”’* The mistrust that dictates the impeachment 
of Luke is so purely subjective that it admits of no ex- 
plicit refutation. All that can be said is that the incidents 
are such as might naturally occur, in the course of the 
labors of an Apostle, and present no greater degree of re- 
semblance, in the two cases, than might be expected. 

Equally groundless is the critical attack upon the authen- 
ticity of the speeches contained in the Acts, and the charge 
that they were invented by the Author. That the lan- 
guage is, in the main, the Author’s is conceded, since some 
of them were made in the Aramaic; for example, the ad- 
dress of Paul to the mob at Jerusalem.’ Most of them 
are condensed ; none of them, as recorded, would occupy 
in the delivery, more than six minutes. Of course this 
condensation would involve a substitution, to a considerable 
extent, of Luke’s own phraseology for that of the several 
speakers.’ Beyond these necessary changes, there is no 
reason to impute a lack of correctness to the reports of 
the speeches ; much less, to make them the product of a 
wholesale invention. The verbal resemblances which are 
brought forward to sustain this imputation are quite in- 
conclusive. Stephen says (Acts viii. 2) :— 


2x. 25, 26. * xiv. 13 seq. Sy. 40. 

* xvi. 22, seq. “Supernatural Religion,” iii. 71. 

5 Acts xxii. See Acts xxi. 40. 5 Reuss, Hinl., ind. N. T., p. 207. 

™The Author of “ Supernatural Religion ” (Vol. iii. ch. 3) expends 
much space in a comparison of the vocabulary of the speeches with 
the language of the Book elsewhere. It is a characteristic effort te 
prove what is not disputed. 


THE SPEECHES IN THE ACTS. 911 


“ΜΡ, brethren, fathers, hear.”” Paul, in the synagogue 
at: Antioch in Pisidia, is addressed by the rulers (Acts xiii. 
15): “‘ Men, brethren... .. say on;” and Paul there- 
upon thus begins: “ Men of Israel, and ye that fear God, 
hear.” This is one of the instances relied upon to prove that 
the speeches were invented by Luke.’ It might as well be 
inferred that the reports of speeches in the House of Com- 
mons are invented by the editors of the newspapers in 
which they appear, because they begin with “ Mr. Speaker ;” 
or that the speeches of lawyers in the courts are composed 
by the reporter, since they so often open with “ Gentle- 
men of the Jury.” As regards the contents of the speeches 
in the Acts, it is altogether probable that in the first ad- 
dresses of the Apostles to Jewish auditors, there would be 
a reference to the guilt involved in the crucifixion, and to 
the proof of the Messiahship of Jesus which was fur- 
nished by His resurrection; and that certain passages in 
the Prophets would be habitually referred to as verified in 
the conduct of the Jews, and in the life and death of 
Jesus. There is no greater similarity in the substance 
of these addresses than would naturally be expected 
under the circumstances. ? When we study them in- 
dividually, we find in some of them convincing proof of 


1 “Supernatural Religion,” iii. 160. 

2 The Author of “ Supernatural Religion,” who is quite confident in 
his accusations under this head, might find a confutation in his own re- 
marks, in the same volume, upon alleged quotations from the Acts, in 
the Pastor of Hermas, Ignatius, and some other writers. ‘There was 
in fact no formula more current either amongst the Jews or in the early 
Church ν᾿ “A formula is employed which is common throughout the 
New Testament;” “Along with much similarity, there is likewise diver- 
gence between these sentences ;” “He simply sets forth from the pro- 
phets, direct, the doctrines which formed the great text of the early 
church ” (vol. iii. 8, 9, 13, 17),—these are a few of the statements, some 
of which are well founded, by the same Author in reference to coinci- 
dences which he wishes to prove to be accidental. 


312 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


authenticity. The whole spirit and tenor of the discourse 
of Stephen (Acts vii.), especially when it is considered in 
relation to the accusation of blasphemy against the law and 
the temple, to which he was replying, have the strongest 
verisimilitude. How natural is the gradually rising in- 
dignation which is kindled in his mind by the rehearsal of 
the long disobedience of the Jews! As he follows this 
course of iniquity down to the final act, the destruction of 
“the Just One,” his indignation bursts forth at last in a 
stream of denunciation. The farewell of Paul to the 
Ephesian elders at Miletus (Acts xx. 18-35) abounds in 
expressions characteristic of the Apostle. Its whole tone 
is a testimony to its genuineness. “Ye yourselves know 
that these hands have ministered to my necessities” '—we 
can almost see the gesture with which these words were 
accompanied. Paul’s speech on Mars Hill (Acts xvii. 22- 
31), in its choice of topics, in its conciliatory introduc- 
tion, in the manner in which the way is paved for the final 
declaration respecting the judgment and resurrection,’ is 
marked by originality, and by a character fully accordant 
with what we should expect from the Apostle. How en- 
tirely gratuitous, and without proof, is the assertion that 
this speech was manufactured by the historian ! 

The theory ofa tendency, or doctrinal purpose, in Luke, 
impelling him to substitute fictions for facts, is confuted 
by his omission to avail himself of the most ready opportu- 
nities for securing the end which he is assumed to have 
been pursuing. One or two instances may be specified. 
There is a difficulty about the visit of Paul and Barnabas 
to Jerusalem, when according to Luke (xi.30) they carried 
to the brethren there the alms of the Antioch Christians ; 
since Paul does not mention this visit, as we should expect 
him to do, in Galatians ii. It has been suggested as one 


1 Ver. 34. 2 Ver. 31. 


THE BOOK OF ACTS, ols 


possible and not unreasonable solution, that Paul was, for 
some cause, prevented from entering the city, or failed to meet 
the other Apostles. But the Tiibingen critics are not con- 
tent with any explanation of this sort; they are not even 
willing to allow that Luke made a mistake ; but their sharp 
eyes discover a deliberate intention having for its motive a 
desire to bring Paul and the other Apostles together as 
often as possible! Under the simplest statement, their 
“‘ optical infirmity,” as Neander somewhere calls it, detects 
a deep plan of deception. It is surely most remarkable, if 
Luke made up this story, that he makes no mention of an 
interview between Paul and the other Apostles. He barely 
states that he went to Jerusalem, and went back again. 
We are asked to believe that the Evangelist invented the 
whole tale of a famine, and of the sympathy excited at 
Antioch, merely for the purpose of saying in the fewest and 
baldest terms that Paul went to Jerusalem! How much 
farther can this credulity, born of suspicion, go? If Luke 
was intent upon the object ascribed to him, why does he 
not record and embellish the fact, mentioned by Paul him- 
self, of his stay for fifteen days with Peter? This is a 
fact which a writer actuated by the design attributed to 
Luke, would infallibly have laid hold of, and turned to 
account. Paul and Peter together for a fortnight in the 
same dwelling! What an opportunity would this afford 
for weaving fictions of the kind which the Evangelist is 
accused of fabricating! Then, why did the Author neglect 
to bring Paul and Peter together at last at Rome, where, 
according to the tradition, both perished as martyrs? Why 
throw away so fair an occasion for the furtherance of his 
scheme of exhibiting the two leading Apostles in amity one 
with another ? 

If Luke’s omissions are incompatible with the fraudu- 
lent purpose with which he is credited, so, also, are numer- 


314 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


ous features actually introduced into his narrative. If, 
as is alleged, he is bent upon elevating Paul, why does he, 
at the very outset, record the fact that a new Apostle was 
chosen in the room of Judas, in order to make up the num- 
ber of twelve, and why does he set down the speech of Peter 
in which the necessity for this act is explained? Such a pro- 
ceeding on the part of the Author of the Acts is incompre- 
hensible upon the Tiibingen hypothesis respecting his aim. 
By such an act he would stultify himself. One of the most 
signal examples of a mode of writing utterly incompatible 
with that hypothesis, is presented in the xxist chapter. 
Luke, it is said, labors to represent the Jewish Christians 
in a fraternal relation to Paul, and to cover up the antago- 
nism which, it is affirmed, subsisted between them. ‘This, 
we are assured, is a main end for which the book was 
written. This motive gives rise, it is claimed, to numerous 
distortions of fact, and not a few downright fictions. 
Now, in the xxist chapter, Luke records the statement of 
James to the effect that the Jewish Christians at Jerusa- 
lem, many thousands in number, were prejudiced against 
Paul, their ears having been filled with the story that 
he was trying to lead the Jews to give up Moses. Here 
Luke sets down the very last thing he would have been 
willing to mention, if the Tiibingen judgment of him 
had any good foundation. One would think that this 
passage would strike the critics dumb. The only thing 
they are able to say is, that Luke forgets his part, and 
brings out the truth unwittingly! Yet in this very 
narrative—for instance, in the account of the origin of 
the mob against Paul—it is maintained that Luke has 
artfully perverted the facts for the purpose of concealing 
the antipathy of the Jewish Christians towards the Apostle 
to the Gentiles! He must have been on the watch, 
then; he must have written with deliberation. The 


THE BOOK OF ACTS. 315 


Tubingen solution of the difficulty, weak enough at the 
best, is stripped of every vestige of plausibility by the 
imputations with which it is coupled. 

There is one argument for the genuineness and credibil- 
ity of the book of Acts, which must carry an almost irre- 
sistible force to every unprejudiced mind. It is drawn 
from the relation of the Acts to the Pauline Epistles. The 
undesigned coincidences between the two authorities have 
been skilfully pointed out by Paley, in the Hore Pau- 
line. They constitute a special source of evidence of great 
weight. But to this branch of proof we do not now refer. 
It is obvious to the student of the New Testament that the 
Acts was written independently of the Epistles. The great 
effort of the Tubingen critics is to point out discrepancies, 
and to convict Luke of something worse than gross inaccu- 
racy, by an appeal to statements that lie on the face of the 
Epistles. This attempt we deem to be a total failure, and 
have given reasons for this opinion. But so much is indis- 
putably true, that the book of Acts, is, in no sense, framed 
on the basis of the Epistles, by the use of the historical 
statements contained in them. There is no trace of an 
endeavor on the part of Luke to fit his narrative to these 
other documents. [5 is, throughout, an independent book. 
Now if a writer in the second century, or at the close of 
the first, had set out to construct artificially a history of 
the Apostles, for such a purpose as that imputed to Luke, 
it is incredible that he should have left aside in this way 
the Pauline and other Apostolic Epistles. These were in 
the hands of the churches for which his book was intended, 
and on which he wished to produce a certain impression. 
How impossible that he should not make it his first busi- 
ness to dove-tail his artificial narrative into these other 
familiar documents of recognized authority! If the book 
of Acts had been written as Baur and Zeller say it was 


316 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


written, they would have found no such material out of 
which to construct their plausible, but sophistical argu- 
ments against its credibility. Paul’s sojourn in Arabia 
would not have been left out, his journeys to Jerusalem 
would have tallied palpably with those noticed in the Epis- 
tle to the Galatians, and on a great variety of points we 
should hear the echoes of the statements made by the 
Apostle himself in his acknowledged writings. The phe- 
nomena are just what we should expect if the book was 
written at no great interval after the events recorded in 
it, and by one who drew his knowledge partly from per- 
sonal observation, and partly from oral representation, 
emanating from others. The phenomena are not at all 
such as we should confidently expect if the Author, at a 
later epoch, with the Epistles of Paul in his hands, had 
sat down to compose an artificial narrative for a partisan, 
or doctrinal purpose. 

The book of Acts, though it does not conclude abruptly, 
breaks off at an interesting point in the history. We can 
account for the hurried, condensed ending of the Gospel 
of Luke, by supposing that he was intending to com- 
pose another work, the Acts, in which the intercourse of 
Jesus with His Disciples after His Resurrection is more 
fully stated. The manner in which this second book ends 
is not due to the fact that it was written at the point where 
the narrative terminates, since its date is later than that of 
the Gospel. Moreover, no details are given about the life 
of Paul during the two years which, as the Author states, 
he spent at Rome. A hundred reasons might be imagined 
to account for this. Luke may have been ill, or may have 
died, and thus have been prevented from executing his 
plan. But the conclusion of the Acts, before the death 
of Paul or of Peter, has suggested the plausible supposi- 
tion that he may have intended to compose a third work, 


THE STYLE OF LUKE. 917 


but may have been precluded from carrying out his pur- 
pose." 

From an historical point of view, a distinction is to be 
made between that portion of Luke’s narrative in which 
he speaks as an eye-witness, and even as an actor in the 
transactions which he records, and that part of the work 
in which he presents information which he has obtained 
from others. As far as this portion of the work is concerned, 
the materials of which were gained by inquiry, it stands 
precisely on a level with his Gospel. It is to be remem- 
bered, in reference to both books, that they emanate from 
a trusted acquaintance of the Apostle Paul. Their state- 
ments are to be tested and elucidated by comparison with 
the Apostolic Epistles. The date of the third Gospel, as 
will be shown, is about the year 70. The date of the Acts, 
we infer from the introduction, and from other evidence, 
was not many years later. We shall not be very wide of 
the mark, if we place it at a. Ὁ. 80, 

Luke, like every other writer, has his own style. A 
certain rhetorical manner is not unfrequently manifest, 
which readily explains itself to any one versed in literary 
criticism. When, for example, he makes James say that 
many “ myriads ’’—tens of thousands—of Jewish Christians, 
were in Jerusalem, no one would understand it as a strictly 
statistical statement.? So when he says that “all” of the 
believers at Jerusalem sold their houses and lands, the 
statement is qualified by incidental remarks afterwards, 
which imply that there were still possessors of private pro- 
perty.* In the account of the private consultation of the 
Sanhedrim upon the case of Peter and John, Luke makes 
the members put their heads together, and say to one 
another that it is useless to deny the miracle wrought by 


1 Meyer, Apostelgeschichte, Hinl., p. 14. 2 Acts xxi. 20. 
5. Acts ii. 45. 


318 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the Apostles, since the fact is manifest to all Jerusalem; 
but that the further spread of the fact among the people 
must be prevented by silencing the Apostles (Acts iv. 16). 
It has been objected that the members of the Sanhedrim 
would hardly make such an admission to one another in so 
bald a form. But, in such a case, as Neander suggests, a 
writer like Luke might naturally give to the process of 
reasoning which prompted the act of the Sanhedrim, he 
might give to the motives that influenced them, the form of 
a verbal statement, or conversation.’ They took a certain 
course, and consciously for this reason. Luke’s report of the 
speeches of the Apostles and of others is marked, as we 
have said, by verisimilitude. They speak in character. 
There are expre:sions in Paul’s speeches which are evi- 
dently transmitted with literal fidelity. Yet the art of 
phonographic reporting did not exist. Condensation might 
often be necessary in the records of such addresses. And 
the fact that no strictly verbal report is attempted, is 
proved by the style, which has the characteristic vocabu- 
Jary of Luke. Luke, in relating the mortal illness with 
which Herod was seized, after an act of signal impiety, 
says that an angel smote him (Acts xii. 23). He 
does not mean that an angel was visibly present. There 
was a special act of Providence, a judgment of the Al- 
mighty; and the supernatural element is thus conceived 
and described by the historian. The passage, when it is 
carefully considered, may throw light upon other events 
which are connected by Luke with the intervention, or in- 
strumentality, of angels. 

These remarks pertain to the interpretation of the Au- 
thor. They do not touch his faithfulness and credibility. 
The attack of the recent critics is founded upon a subjective 
and narrow conception of the contents of Christ’s teaching, 


1 Plant. and Train. of the Ch,, p. 41. 


THE WRITINGS OF LUKE. 319 


and upon an untenable hypothesis relative to the doctrinal 
position of the Judeo-Christian Apostles. It is sustained 
by means of sophistical exegesis. The imagined “ ten- 
dency ” of Luke, it is not unfrequently found necessary 
to say, is a tendency in the other direction. Hence the 
various notions of an “ Ur—Lukas,’”’ and of a mingling 
of heterogeneous documents,—notions which cannot stand 
the test of a critical examination. A larger view of the 
subject, and a fairer treatment of the Author, would save 
the critics from committing themselves to the advocacy of 
these crude and short-lived hypotheses. 


320 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER Χ. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 


A GENERATION has elapsed since the discussion of the 
authenticity of the Gospel which is traditionally ascribed 
to John, was commenced by Ferdinand Christian Baur and 
his associates of the Tiibingen school. We may review the 
case as it now stands, in light of the evidence and argu- 
ments which have been adduced in the progress of this 
long and active controversy.’ 

It is well agreed that down to a quite modern date 
the genuineness of the Fourth Gospel was undisputed. It 
is true that Epiphanius speaks of an insignificant sect, 
whom he names Alogi, who were found in Asia Minor, 
especially at Thyatira, probably not much later than A. Ὁ. 
150, and who rejected this Gospel.? But it is clear that 
their leading motive was a theological prejudice, with which, 
to be sure, they connected certain other objections growing 
out of a comparison of this Gospel with the other three, 
But they rejected the Apocalypse, as well as the Gospel ; 
and as they attributed the latter to Cerinthus, a contempo- 
rary of John at Ephesus, their opposition rather tells for, 
than against, its genuineness. As Zeller concedes,’ no 


1 For the literature, see Mr. Gregory’s App. to the Engl. Transl. of 
Luthardt’s Der johanneische Ursprung d. 4tn Evang. (Leipsic, 1874). 

2 Her, li. c. 3. 28; liv.,1; cf. Irenzeus, Adv. Her. IIL. ii. 9, and Philas- 
trius, Her., 60. 

* Theol. Jahrb., 1845, p. 645 seq. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 321 


evidence can be derived from this unimportant sect for the 
existence of another tradition as to the authorship of the 
Gospel than that which connects it with the Apostle. 

The strongest consideration, as far as external proof is 
concerned, centres in Polycarp and in the relations of Ire- 
neeus to this Father. Polycarp died as a martyr, it is now 
ascertained, in A. D. 155.1 Since at that time he had been 
“eighty and six years in the Lord,” his birth was as early 
as A. Ὁ. 69. His high standing and wide influence are 
fully attested, independently of all questions pertaining to 
this Gospel. Situated as he was, and having, as we shall 
see, personally known the Apostle John, it is plain that 
if we had the testimony of Polycarp to the Johannine 
authorship of the Gospel, nothing more nor higher in the 
way of historical proof could be desired. Such direct and 
formal testimony we have not; but it may be true, never- 
theless, that we have what is fully equivalent to it. The 
only extant writing of Polycarp is an Epistle to the Phil- 
ippians, which, among various expressions which are evi- 
dently derived from the Epistles of Paul, and other New 
Testament books, introduces a statement that occurs almost 
verbatim in the first Epistle of John?? The common au- 
thorship of the Gospel and Epistle is a well-established fact. 
The genuineness of Polycarp’s Epistle, which is attested 
by Irenzeus,’ and is not without strong internal evidence in 
its support,* ought not to be questioned. Yet, as it is 
called in question by some, and as the source of the pas- 
sage in Polycarp, to which we have referred, cannot be dem- 
onstrated to be the First Epistle of John, although an 


1 Waddington, Mémoires de ? Académie des Inscript. et Belles Lettres, 
tome xxvi., P. 2, p. 232 seq. 

2 Polycarp, Philippians, vii. (1 John ivy. 3). 

3 See ce. v. and vi., where only two classes of ministers in the Philip- 


pian Church are mentioned, presbyters and deacons, 
“ Ady. Her. III. ii. 4. 


322 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


unbiased judgment would hardly doubt that such was its 
origin, we would not insist on this quotation as conclu- 
sively proving the acquaintance of Polycarp with the Johan- 
nine writings. 

The proof of this fact rests mainly on the relation of 
Trenzeus to Polycarp, and on the inferences which we are 
necessitated to draw from it. Irenzeus was himself a na- 
tive of Asia Minor, where he spent his youth. In 177, he 
became Bishop of Lyons, where he had previously been a 
Presbyter. We shall not be far out of the way if we set 
the date of his birth at 130." From the pen of Irenzus 
we have reminiscences of his intercourse with Polycarp. 
Florinus,one of the associates of Irenzeus in his youth, sub- 
sequently embraced the Gnostic heresy. Irenzeus addressed 
to him a letter, from which the following is an extract? :— 


Those opinions, Florinus, that I may speak in mild terms, are not 
of sound doctrine ; those opinions are not in agreement with the Church, 
and involve those who adopt them in the deepest impiety ; those opin- 
ions not even the heretics outside of the Church have ever ventured to 
broach ; those opinions the elders who were before us, who were the pu- 
pils of the Apostles, did not deliver to you. For while I was still a boy, 
T saw you in Lower Asia, with Polycarp, when you were in a brilliant 
position in the royal palace, and strove to approve yourself to him. For 
T recall better what occurred at that time than I do recent events, since 
what we learned in childhood, being united to the soul as it grows up, 
becomes incorporated with it, so that I can even describe the place in 
which the blessed Polycarp used to sit and discourse, his goings out, too, 
and his comings in, the manner of his life and form of his body, and his 
discourses which he used to deliver to the people, and how he spoke of 
his familiar intercourse with John and with the rest of those who had 
heard the Lord, and how he would call to mind their words. And 
whatever things he had heard from them respecting the Lord, both as 
to His miracles and His teaching, just as Polycarp had received it from 
the eye-witnesses of the Word of Life, he recounted it agreeably to the 


1 See Mr. C. J. H. Ropes’s thorough Article, Irenceus of Lyons (Bw. 
Sacra, April 1877). 
2 Epist. ad Flor. τι. (Stieren’s ed. i. 822). 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 323 


Scriptures. These things, through the mercy of God which was upon me, I 
diligently heard, and treasured them up, not on paper, but in my heart ; 
and I am continually, by the grace of God, revolving these things in my 
mind ; and I can bear witness before God that, if that blessed and apos- 
tolic elder had ever heard any such thing, he would have cried out and 
stopped his ears, saying, as he was wont to say: ‘Good God! unto 
what times hast Thou reserved me that I should endure these things?” 
And he would have fled from the very place, whether sitting or standing, 
had he heard such words. 


In his copious work on Heresies, Ireneus speaks at 
some length of his personal relations to Polyearp :'— 


But Polycarp, also, was not only instructed by the Apostles, and con- 
versed with many who had seen Christ, but was also, by Apostles in 
Asia, appointed bishop of the church in Smyrna, whom I also saw in 
my early youth, for he tarried (on earth) a very long time, and, when a 
very old man, gloriously and most nobly suffering martyrdom, departed 
this life, having always taught the things which he had learned from 
the Apostles, and which the church has handed down, and which alone 
are true. To these things all the Asiatic churches testify, as do also 
those men who have succeeded Polycarp down to the present time,—a 
man who was of much greater weight, and a more steadfast witness of 
truth, than Valentinus, and Marcion, and the rest of the heretics. He 
it was who, coming to Rome in the time of Anicetus, caused many to 
turn away from the aforesaid heretics to the Church of God, proclaiming 
that he had received this one and sole truth from the Apostles,—that, 
namely, which is handed down by the Church. There are, also, those 
who heard from him that John, the disciple of the Lord, going to bathe 
at Ephesus, and perceiving Cerinthus within, rushed out of the bath- 
house without bathing, exclaiming, “ Let us fly, lest even the bath-house 
fall down, because Cerinthus, the enemy of the truth, is within.” And 
Polycarp himself replied to Marcion, who met him on one occasion, and 
said, “ Dost thou know me?” “T do know thee, the first-born of 
Satan.” Such was the horror which the Apostles and their disciples had 
against holding even a verbal communication with any corrupters of the 
truth ; as Paul also says, “ A man that is an heretic, after the first and 
second admonition, reject; knowing that he that is such is subverted, 
and sinneth, being condemned of himself’’ There is also a very power- 
ful epistle of Polycarp written to the Philippians, from which those who 
choose to do so, and are anxious about their salvation, can learn the 
character of his faith, and the preaching of the truth. Then, again, 


1 Ady, Her, iii. 3, 4. 


324 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the Church at Ephesus, founded by Paul, and having John remaining 
among them permanently until the times of Trajan, is a true witness 
of the tradition of the Apostles. 

Again, in a Letter of Ireneus to Victor, Bishop of 
Rome, a fragment of which remains, there is a reference to 
a visit of Polycarp to Rome (between a. Ὁ. 150 and A. Ὁ. 
155), when Anicetus was Bishop there, and to the appeal 
then made by Polycarp to the instruction which he had 
received from John and other Apostles.’ Elsewhere, Ire- 
neeus frequently refers to the elders, disciples of the Apos- 
tles, from whom he had received information. In these 
passages, the term “elder” does not denote an office; but 
the ‘“‘elders” are the Fathers—worthies of a preceding 
time. His authorities were those who had directly con- 
versed with the Apostles, or such as the pupils of the 
Apostles had taught.? Especially through his acquaint- 
ance with Polycarp, he was separated by only a single link 
from the Apostle John. These extracts from IJrenzus 
need no comment. They discover to us the associations in 
which he stood in his youth. With Irenzus, the Johan- 
nine authorship of the Fourth Gospel is a fact perfectly 
familiar, and above all question. He even argues fanci- 
fully that there must be four, and only four, Gospels, 
finding analogies in the four winds, and the four quarters 
of the globe.* This only shows how free from every 
shadow of doubt was his confidence in the authenticity 
of the Gospels acknowledged by the Church. 

Now is it supposable that Irenzeus, and his contempora- 
ries with him, received this Gospel as the work of the 
Apostle John, without doubt or question, while Polycarp, 

1 Frag. 111., Stieren’s ed., p. 824 seq. 

2 Adv. Her. ii. 22,5 (cf. Euseb., H. E,, iii. 23), iii. 1,1 (cf. Euseb., 
H. E. v. 8), iii. 3,4 (ef. Euseb., H. E., iv. 14), v. 30, 1 (cf. Euseb., H 


E., v. 8), v. 33, 3, v. 33, 4. 
5 Adv. Her. iii. 12, 8. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 325 


John’s pupil and their teacher, was either ignorant of its 
existence, or rejected it? The testimony of Irenzus vir- 
tually involves in it the testimony of the Teacher who lived 
until Irenzeus had grown up to manhood. Polycarp was a 
tepresentative man. That he received a Gospel as from 
John which the bishops and churches about him rejected, 
cannot for a moment be supposed. Had a conflict of this 
kind existed, the sound of it would have reverberated far 
and wide. The testimony of Irenzeus takes us back into 
the circle of “ Elders,” to whom the Apostle John had been 
personally known, and who were able to describe his looks, 
and report his words. There is nothing in the character 
of Irenzeus, or in his habits of mind, to weaken the value 
of the evidence which he affords on a point of this nature. 
He may be faulty in his taste, as in his reference to cosmi- 
cal analogies for the quadruple character of the Gospel 
history. But this carries no impeachment of his veracity. 
Though not a man of very remarkable powers, he is far 
from being weak. He is no dreamer. Instead of being 
addicted to speculation, he represents the practical tendency 
in theology. Against all innovators, he perpetually holds 
up the doctrine transmitted by the Apostles in the churches 
which they had planted. He rests always upon the his- 
torical argument. But the main fact in the case is his 
own unquestioning acceptance of the Fourth Gospel as the 
work of John, taken in connection with his relations to 
Polyearp. ‘And this fact stands, be bis special intellectual 
qualities what they may. 

Occasionally, it is true, he falls into error in accepting 
traditions. There are only three instances which are 
worthy of note; and an attention to them will show that 
they afford no ground for distrusting the statements which 
we have cited from his pen. Alluding to the parting of 
Paul from the elders at Miletus (Acts xx. 17 seq.), he 


326 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


speaks of them as the elders and bishops of Ephesus and 
the neighboring places ;* as if the precedence of the bishop 
over his associate elders had existed at that early day in 
the several churches. Considering the way in which the 
precedence of the bishop over the presbyters arose, that 
this arrangement was not a sudden creation, but grew up 
by little and little, it is not strange that Irenzus should 
have thus antedated the episcopal system. Irenceus states 
that the book of Revelation was written in the reign of 
Domitian, late in the first century.2_ The better opinion 
among scholars now is, that it was composed earlier, shortly 
before the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus. This is a 
particular point of chronology in which an error might 
easily become involved in the tradition,—a point which 
Trenzus would not be led to investigate. A stranger mis- 
take is made when he affirms that Jesus lived to be nearly 
fifty years of age.* This opinion is the more unexpected, 
since he is familiar with the succession of events in the 
Saviour’s life, and says that he thrice attended the Pass- 
over at Jerusalem.* But the conversation recorded by 
John (viii. 57), in which the Jews said to Jesus: “Thou 
art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham ?”— 
early suggested the quite unwarrantable inference that 
Jesus was then near that age. It was probably imagined 
that an interval occurred between His baptism, and His 
public ministry. This notion, be it observed, was derived 
from a passage found in John alone; and this goes to show 
the presence of the Gospel among those with whom Ire- 
neeus was early familiar. Instances of an adoption by 
Trenzeus, of errors of this sort which had become mingled 
in the stream of tradition, even were they more numerous 


' Ady. Her., iii. 14, 2: “ Convocatis episcopis et presbyteris,” etc. 
2 Adv. Her., v. 30, 3. 8 Adv. Heer., ii. 22, 5. 
* Ibid. ii. 22, 3. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 327 


instead of being few in number, would not seriously affect 
the value of his testimony upon the great matter which we 
are now considering. Here is a book having the strongly 
marked peculiarities of the Fourth Gospel, a book which 
must have been recognized as the production of John by 
Polycarp, his immediate disciple, an influential bishop in 
the very region where the Apostle had lived and labored. 
If John did not write it, how could such a work emerge 
into existence, and find a universal acceptance in the region 
where the Apostle had lived, and among those who had 
personally known him, and heard his teaching? We 
might as reasonably suppose that one of the earthquakes, 
not unfrequent in that region, occurred without the notice 
of the inhabitants. 

Keim, the author of the “ History of Jesus,” thinks 
himself able to invalidate the testimony of Irenzeus, and 
even to make it appear that the Apostle John never lived 
in Asia Minor at all. Eusebius, referring to a statement 
of Irenzeus that Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, was a hearer 
of John, says that Papias himself, in the preface of his 
work, does not claim to be this; and Eusebius intimates 
that Irenseus may have misunderstood in this particular 
the passage which he proceeds to quote from Papias, and 
in which John the Presbyter, a second John, is mentioned, 
as well as John the Apostle.’ Of John the Presbyter, 
Eusebius adds, Papias elsewhere states himself to have 
been a hearer. The construction which Eusebius puts 
upon the passage cited from Papias is unquestionably cor- 
rect. It does not imply that he was, or that he was not, a 
hearer of the Apostle. On the ground of this remark of 
Eusebius, Keim leaps to the inference that Irenzeus con- 
founded John the Apostle with the Presbyter of the same 
name, and would persuade us that it was the Presbyter 


1H. E. iii. 39, 


328 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


to whom Polycarp referred in the discourses about John 
of which Irenzeus speaks. He thinks that his theory is 
confirmed by the circumstance that Irenzeus quotes from 
Papias, “the hearer of John” [the Apostle], a passage about 
the millennium which, as Keim avers, Eusebius refers to 
to the Presbyter. This extraordinary theory of Keim has 
found little applause even in the skeptical school of critics, 
few of whom are disposed to give up the Johannine au- 
thorship of the Apocalypse; and it has been confuted satis- 
factorily by Hilgenfeld.' It may be well, however, to 
comment upon it briefly. First, it is not at all certain that 
Eusebius is right in thinking Irenzus mistaken with re- 
gard to Papias. Irenzeus does not say that he found out 
from the preface of Papias that he was a hearer οἵ the 
Apostle. He may have ascertained it in some other way. 
Eusebius, it should be observed, has a strong dislike to 
Papias on account of his millennial notions. Secondly, 
whether Irenzeus misunderstood an expression of Papias, 
or not, and even if Papias were not a hearer of the Apos- 
tle—we do not know in what place, how far from Ephesus, 
Papias spent his youth—it is a monstrous violation of 
logic to infer that Irenzeus misunderstood Polycarp, whom 
he personally knew, and whose discourses he had himself 
heard. Thirdly, it is not true that Eusebius attributes to 
the Presbyter the millennial notions of Papias. On the 
contrary he says that Papias misunderstood “ the apostoli- 
cal narratives.” 2? The passages which we have quoted at 
length from Trenzeus are not the only references to Poly- 
carp’s acquaintance with the Apostle. Irenzeus relates the 
anecdote of John’s fleeing from Cerinthus in the bath, as a 
fact which, not he himself, but others had learned from 
Polycarp.* These informants of Irenzeus, we must also 


1 Finl. in d. N. T., p. 394 seq. 5. ἘΠῚ E. iii. 39: 
3 Adv. Her., iii. 3. 4 (Euseb., H. Ε. iv. 14). 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 329 


suppose, blundered equally with himself, if another John 
was meant. In discussing a passage in the Apocalypse, 
he refers to the testimony of “those men who saw John 
face to face.” Elsewhere he refers to “the elders ”— 
more than one—who had seen the Apostle.? In _ his 
Letter to Victor, Bishop of Rome, he refers to the inter- 
course of Polycarp and Anicetus, in which Polycarp had 
refused to yield up his opinion on the Passover question, 
‘because John, the Disciple of our Lord, and the rest of 
the Apostles with whom he had associated” had sanctioned 
the Asiatic usage.’ Fourthly, Polycarp is not the only wit- 
ness to the sojourn of the Apostle in Asia. Apollonius, an 
Asiatic bishop in the second century, who wrote against the 
Montanists, an earlier writer than Irenzeus, is another wit- 
ness to the residence of the Apostle at Ephesus.* Polycrates, 
himself a Bishop of Ephesus who, at the time of his con- 
troversy with Victor of Rome, was “sixty-five years in 
the Lord,” who was born, therefore, as early as A. Ὁ. 125, 
gives the same testimony as Irenzus respecting John’s 
residence in Asia.” Clement of Alexandria was likewise 
well acquainted with circumstances connected with John’s 
ministry and death in Asia.° Justin Martyr, and all 
others, who attributed the Apocalypse to the Apostle, vir- 
tually testify to the same fact. Those who, like Keim, sup- 
pose that the author of the Gospel—whoever he may have 
been—proceeded on the supposition that John had lived in 
Asia Minor, cannot reasonably deny this fact. So that as 
early as from A.D. 110 to a. p. 120, by the confession of 
these critics, the belief must have prevailed in that region 
that the Apostle had lived and died there. Nothing more 
need be said in reply to a conjecture so baseless, and so at 
variance with strong and multiplied historical proofs. 


1 Thid., v. 30, 1. 2 Tbid.,v. 33. 5 EKuseb. H. E., v. 24. 
4 EKuseb., H. E., v. 18. 5 Thid., ili. 31. 6 Kuseb., H. E., iii. 23. 


330 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


We may connect with the evidence drawn from Ireneus 
for the Johannine authorship, testimony from two other 
sources nearly contemporary with him, but widely se- 
parated both from him and from one another, in place. 
The first is the Muratorian Fragment on the Canon, which 
says: “ The Fourth of the Gospels is the work of John, one 
of the Disciples” —in contrast with Luke and Mark, who are 
mentioned just before. ‘‘Exhorted by his fellow-disciples 
and bishops, he said: ‘ Fast with me to-day for three days, 
and let us relate to each other what has been revealed to 
each of us.’ On the same night, it was revealed to Andrew, 
one of the Apostles, that John should in his own name 
write down everything (cuncta describeret), and all should 
certify ” (recogniscentibus cunctis). 

Clement of Alexandria, reporting the tradition as to the 
order of the Gospels, which had come to him from the oldest 
Presbyters, says that “last of all, John, perceiving that in 
the other Gospels those things were related which pertained 
to bodily things (τὰ σωματιχά), being encouraged by his 
familiar friends, and urged by the Spirit, wrote a spiritual 
Gospel.” ? 

Say what we will of the details of these traditions, they 
contain a strong attestation to the main fact of the compo- 
sition of the Gospel by John. 

But we have proofs farther back in the second century. 
The evidence of a use of the Fourth Gospel by Justin 
Martyr, especially as drawn from the passage respecting 
regeneration,” is not weakened by verbal inaccuracies of 


1 Euseb., H. E., vi.14. On these passages, Mr. Matthew Arnold (God and 
the Bible, p. 248) constructs a theory that the Ephesian Presbytery made 
over a book of which John furnished the materials, or a partof them. It 
isa pity that the sole patristic support for this conjecture lies in a mistrans- 
lation of the “recogniscentibus” (attesting) of the “Muratorian Frag- 
ment,” which Mr. Arnold renders by the word “ revise.” 

2 Apol., 1. 61 (John iii. 6). 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 331 


quotation, which are common to him and to the fathers 
generally, and which, as regards this particular passage, are 
not without a parallel in modern Christian writers. The no- 
tion that this passage was borrowed by Justin from another 
source, which was used also by the author of the Pseudo-Cle- 
mentine Homilies,’ is seen to be without foundation when 
the phraseology of the quotations in this work is compared 
with corresponding citations in Justin, and in view of the 
fact that the Homilies are now known to contain a passage 
from the Fourth Gospel.’ Apart from particular passages, 
the theology of Justin, his doctrine of the Logos, or Word, 
presupposes an acquaintance with some authoritative Scrip- 
ture in which these terms and conceptions are presented. 
Tatian, the pupil of Justin, composed a sort of Harmony, 
the Diatessaron, which, as there is good ground for affirm- 
ing, was based on the four Gospels of the Canon. The 
same conclusion as that drawn from the theology of Justin, 
may fairly be derived from the contents of the seven Igna- 
tian Epistles, the genuineness of which, in the shorter form, 
is rendered more and more probable with the progress of 
critical inquiry. There are passages in these Epistles, 
moreover, which it is scarcely reasonable to doubt were 
derived from John.‘ 

Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, had known at least two of 
the immediate disciples of Christ, John the Presbyter, a 
contemporary of the Apostle at Ephesus, and Aristion ; 
and possibly, though not certainly, John the Apostle. He 
professes to owe his information to two sources; first, to the 
“elders” themselves; that is, to those who. had heard Jesus ; 


Cf, Hom., xi. 20: 

2 Hom., xix. 22 (John ix. 1seq.). See, also, Hom. iii. 52 (ef. John 
1b.€) ὦ, BS 

5 See Prof. Lightfoot’s Art., Contemporary Review, 1877. 

*E.g., ad Phil. 7 (cf. John iii. 8), ad Rom., 7 (cf. John vi. 33, 51 
seq:). 


302 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


and, secondly, to their pupils, or followers. Eusebius quotes 
from him anecdotes in regard to the composition of Matthew 
and Mark.! Hence it has been rashly inferred that Papias 
was not acquainted with the Gospel of John. But, 
first, the silence of Eusebius affords no proof whatever 
that Papias did not refer to this Gospel. Eusebius, for 
example, notices the use of the Ist Epistle of John by 
Polycarp, but does not mention his quotations from Paul. 
Eusebius, in these references, had a particular end in view. 
Where he found anecdotes of interest respecting the compo- 
sition of canonical books, he presents them ; and instances 
where the Catholic epistles, which were naturally slower in 
gaining circulation and acceptance, were referred to, he 
mentions. Hence, secondly, he does say that Papias used 
the 1st Epistle of John, and this justifies the assertion that 
he used the Fourth Gospel. Moreover, Papias in the 
work from which the extracts in Eusebius are taken, would 
have no motive for reciting circumstances connected with 
the writing of the Fourth Gospel, a comparatively recent and 
familiar event. In short, the silence of Eusebius does not 
imply, in the slightest degree, a silence on the part of 
Papias ; and if it did, the fact would not prove, or tend to 
prove, that Papias was not acquainted with the Fourth 
Gospel, which his use of the 1st Epistle of John shows that 
he knew and accepted. This argument 6 silentio has been 
demonstrated by Professor Lightfoot to be absolutely worth- 
less. ? 

It is worthy of mention that Papias, in his enumeration 
of the Apostles from whom his information directly or indi- 
rectly came, gives the first five—Andrew, Peter, Philip, 
Thomas, and James—in the order in which they are named 
in the Gospel of John, and connects with them the names 
of John and Matthew. That is, the Evangelists, the au- 


ΤΠ ἘΣ 11. 59. ? Contemporary Review, Jan. 1875. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 333 


thors of books, are named together, and John is placed be- 
fore Matthew.’ The Syriac version, whose composition 
falls within the second century—probably several decades 
before its end—includes this Gospel. There is no hint that 
its authorship was ever doubted by the old Syrian churches, 
by the churches of Asia Minor, where its reputed author 
had taught and where he died, nor in any other quarter 
where Christianity had penetrated. It stands in Eusebius 
on the list of canonical books which are undisputed? 

The final endorsement (John xxi. 24), emanating from 
those to whom the Gospel was first given, is found in the 
most ancient manuscripts. It is an independent attestation 
which cannot be discredited without assuming a double 
fraud ; first, the false appearance, given to the preceding 
narrative, of being the work of the Apostle, and secondly 
the pretense that the appended statement is from another 
source than the work which it closes. Instead of supposing 
this complexity of deceit, it is more natural to conclude 
that we have here an authentic certificate, attached to the 
Gospel from the beginning, by those for whose benefit John 
wrote or dictated his narrative. This statement falls in 
remarkably with the statements which we have quoted 
from the Muratorian Fragment respecting the relation of 
John’s associates to the composition of the Gospel, which 
they were to recognize, or certify to; and also with the 
kindred statement of Clement, derived by him from the 
Presbyters of olden time. 

The Paschal controversies of the second century furnish 
no argument against the genuineness of this Gospel. The 
defenders of the Quartodeciman practice found nothing in 
it to clash with their opinion. Polycrates, the venerable 


1 For other proofs of the acquaintance of Papias with the Fourth Gos- 
pel, see Prof. Lightfoot’s Article, Contemporary Review, Oct. 1875. 
* Eusebius, H. E., iii. 25. 


334 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Bishop of Ephesus, who represented the bishops of Asia 
Minor, in his Letter to Victor of Rome, towards the end 
of the second century, referred in support of the Asiatic 
observance, to the example of John “who leaned on the 
bosom of the Saviour.”’ As to the origin and precise nature 
of the Quartodeciman observance, there is not yet an entire 
agreement. Hither their Fast, which preceded the Supper 
on the evening of the 14th Nisan, was a commemoration of 
the crucifixion of Jesus—in which case there is an exact 
correspondence with the chronology of John’s Gospel, or 
the Supper was primarily the Jewish Passover, kept at the 
usual time, and transformed into a Christian festival.2 In 
this last case, it has no weight whatever on one side or the 
other, as to the chronological point in dispute, and conse- 
quently affords no help towards determining the question 
of the authorship of the Fourth Gospel. But whatever 
may be obscure in the history of this controversy, there is 
one fact which is beyond contradiction. Apollinaris, Bishop 
of Hierapolis, the successor, and, it may be, the next suc- 
cessor of Papias, in the second century, recognized the 
Fourth Gospel, and made his appeal to 10. Who will 
believe that after Papias had passed away, or between him 
and Apollinaris—if there was an interval—this Gospel 
first saw the light, or acquired canonical authority ? 


1 Euseb., H. E., v. 24. 

2 This last hypothesis is maintained by Schiirer, in his able and 
learned discussion of the subject (Zeitschrift f. die hist. Theol., 1870, ii. 
pp. 182-284). But this conclusion, he justly holds, is not at all adverse 
to the genuineness of John. “ Eine solche Sitte kann ja Johannes sehr 
wohl beobachtet haben, mag er nun den 13. oder 14. Nisan als den Tag 
des Abschiedsmahls betrachtet haben” (p. 273). The arguments which 
may be adduced in support of the other hypothesis, that there were two 
distinct classes of Quartodecimans, which has been elaborately supported 
by Weitzel and Steitz, are presented in Essays on the Sup. Origin of 
Christ., Suppl. Notes, p. 584 seq. 

ὃ Chronicon Pasch., p. 14. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 335 


Turning to heretics and heretical sects, we find that Cel- 
sus, the earliest writer against Christianity of any note, 
who probably wrote in the reign of Marcus Aurelius (A. Ὁ. 
168-180), resorted to this Gospel, as well as to the other 
three, to get materials for his attack. This is now conceded. 
He speaks, for example, of the Word asa title given to 
Christ by His disciples ;! of circumstances of the crucifixion 
which John alone of the Evangelists records ;? of the pierced 
hands of Jesus as shown to His followers. ὃ 

As to Marcion, the language of Tertullian implies that 
he was acquainted with John’s Gospel, but discarded it 
for the same reason that moved him to acknowledge Paul 
as the only true Apostle. 

Montanism, one of the most remarkable phenomena of 
the second century, had its rise in Phrygia. Our direct 
information, however, relative to the canon accepted by the 
Montanists is scanty ; but there is nothing to lead to the 
opinion that they rejected the Fourth Gospel. But in 
the great doctrinal controversy of the second century be- 
tween the Church and the Gnostics, the Gospel of John 
was allowed as authoritative by both parties. The Basi- 
lidians and Valentinians, sects which sprang up in the 
second quarter of the second century, sought support for 
their tenets by strained interpretations of this Gospel, which 
they, in common with their opponents, acknowledged as an 
Apostolic work. Tertullian expressly states that Valen- 
tinus made use of the four Gospels. 5 Unlike Marcion, who 
would follow no Apostle but Paul, and therefore discarded 
all of the Gospels except Luke, Valentinus relied upon 
perverse and arbitrary interpretation as a means of bolster- 
ing up his doctrines. One of his followers, Heracleon, 


1 Orig. adv. Celsum, ii. 31. 2. ΤΡΊΑ. 11. 86, 89. 8. Thid. ii. 55. 
* Ady. Marcion, iv. 3, 2,5. De carne Christi, 3. 
δ᾽ De Prescript. Heret. ¢. 38. 


336 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


wrote a commentary upon John’s Gospel. Hippolytus refers 
to the interpretation which Valentinus and Basilides gave 
to particular passages in it.’ If it be supposed that what 
was said by adherents of the Gnostic leaders is here imputed 
to the leaders themselves, in a loose mode of reference—a 
construction of the language of Hippolytus for which there 
is no sufficient ground—still there is no reason to doubt that 
the Fourth Gospel was known and acknowledged by the 
heresiarchs themselves. If this was not the fact, it must be 
supposed that the Gospel was fabricated after Valentinus 
invented his system ; an hypothesis which must appear in the 
highest degree improbable to one who brings an unbiased 
judgment to the comparison of the two. It must be sup- 
posed, likewise, that in the heat and ferment of the Gnostic 
controversy, this Gospel, the work of an unknown author, 
was composed, and was accepted by both parties without 
question, and without suspicion, as the genuine production 
of the Apostle John. Such a theory is simply incredible. 
The Fourth Gospel, both by its internal structure, and by 
the way in which it was acknowledged and treated by the 
orthodox and by their antagonists, is proved to have had an 
authoritative standing before the Gnostic heresies to which 
we have referred, were developed. 

Keim, one of the most distinguished of the recent writers 
of the skeptical school, concedes that this Gospel was 
quoted by Valentinus; that it was at hand when Basilides 
wrote, and was, or might have been, used by him ; that it 
was among the Gospels known to Marcion. He concedes, 
moreover, that Justin Martyr derives quotations from it; 
that it preceded the Epistles of Barnabas and the Ignatian 
Epistles ; and that this Gospel was used as early in the 
extant literature as were the other three Gospels.” In 
truth, the most judicious even of the opponents of the Jo- 


1 Ref. omn. Her. vi. 35, vii. 22, 27. 2Geschichte Jesu, i. 137. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 301 


hannine authorship now concede that the external attesta- 
tion in the case of the Fourth Gospel is fully as strong as 
in the case of the other three. The phenomena are what 
we should expect, if, as Irenzeus affirms, the Apostle John 
wrote this Gospel at Ephesus, near the end of the first 
century ; and they are explicable on no other hypothesis. 

The First Epistle of John furnishes a powerful argu- 
ment for the genuineness of the Gospel. Both are by the 
same author. The genuineness of the Epistle was never 
in ancient times called in question. Notwithstanding that 
it does not bear the name of John, it has never been 
ascribed to any other writer, and must have been attrib- 
uted to the Evangelist by its first readers. There are no 
signs init of an attempt to make out a claim to apostolic 
authorship, such as characterize spurious productions. Yet 
the whole tone and contents of the Epistle are such as befit 
an Apostle. Who can believe that the writer himself was 
one “who walketh in darkness,” and was a liar like those 
whom he denounced?! It is extremely probable, as we 
have said, that a passage in Polycarp’s Letter was drawn 
from this Epistle. Eusebius tells us that Papias made use 
of it. Thus the Johannine authorship is strongly attested. 
But this carries with it the Johannine authorship of the 
Gospel. 


The decisive force of the external evidence for the gen- 
uineness of the Fourth Gospel can be neutralized in its 
effect only by internal proofs in the opposite direction 
which are of equal weight. But difficulties which are of 
the writer’s own creation, and feelings which are purely 
subjective, must not be suffered to outweigh positive testi- 
mony. How much room there is for fallacious criticism 
of this nature, is illustrated by the history of the Platonic 


11 John i, 6, ii. 22, 
22 


338 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


dialogues. Panzetius, a noted Stoic philosopher at Athens, 
went so far as to reject the Phedon as not being the work 
of Plato. He admired Plato, but disbelieving in the im- 
mortality of the soul, he thought that the main proposition 
and the arguments of this Dialogue, are unworthy of the 
philosopher to whom it is ascribed. Then, as Grote ob- 
serves, he was probably influenced by a singularity in the 
Phedon—it being the only dialogue in which the author 
mentions himself in the third person,’—a point, it may be 
remarked, in which the Phedon resembles the Fourth 
Gospel. Certain modern critics have rejected “the Laws,” 
on internal grounds. This is done by Zeller, who is also 
one of the opponents of the genuineness of the Gospel. On 
this topic, Grote says: “There are few dialogues in the 
list against which stronger objections on internal grounds 
can be brought than Leges and Menexenus. Yet both of 
them stand authenticated, beyond all reasonable dispute, as 
genuine works of Plato, not merely by the canon of 
Thrasyllus, but, also, by the testimony of Aristotle.”? 
Grote adds: “ Considering that Plato’s period of philo- 
sophie composition extended over fifty years, and that the 
circumstances of his life are most imperfectly known to us, 
it is surely hazardous to limit the range of his varieties, on 
the faith of a critical repugnance not merely subjective and 
fallible, but withal of entirely modern growth.”* 

Tn the case, however, of the Fourth Gospel, the internal 
evidence on the affirmative side is even more impressive 
than the external, and the two sorts of proof corroborate 
one another. 

One of the main points to be considered is the structure 
and contents of the Fourth Gospel when compared with the 
other three—the Synoptists. The Fourth Gospel presents 
an independent, but not a contradictory representation of 


1 Grote’s Plato, i. 158. 2 Ibid. p., 209. 3 Tbid., p. 201. 


JOHN AND THE SYNOPTISTS. 999 


the life and teaching of Christ. His “ country,” according 
to this Gospel, is still Galilee; for this is the proper inter- 
pretation of the passage (John iv. 44) referring to the honor 
bestowed on a prophet out of his own country. There is 
nothing in this Gospel inconsistent with supposing a Gali- 
lean ministry of Jesus, such as the Synoptists describe, 
Such a ministry is implied in John’s narrative.’ On the 
other hand, the Synoptists, although they present us mainly 
with the details of the ministry in Galilee, incidentally, but 
decisively, corroborate the Fourth Gospel in ascribing to 
Jesus, also, a ministry of considerable duration in Judea. 

Matthew follows the account of the Baptism and Tempta- 
tion of Jesus, with the statement: “ Now when Jesus heard 
that John was cast into prison, he departed into Galilee” 
(iv. 12). Mark (i. 14) has a like statement. Luke (iv. 14) 
narrates, also, the departure into Galilee, after the record 
of the Temptation. John records a prior visit to Galilee, 
and a journey thence to Jerusalem to the Passover, after a 
sojourn in Capernaum of “ ποὺ many days” (John ii. 12) ; 
all before John was cast into prison (John iii. 24). The 
return of Jesus to Galilee which is mentioned in John iv. 
3, may be identical with the first visit to Galilee reported 
by the Synoptists, as above stated. Two other Passovers 
are referred to by John (vi. 4, xi. 55). The ministry of 
Jesus must have continued, therefore, for at least two and 
a half years. Whether the “Feast” referred to in John 
v. 1 was a Passover, or not, is uncertain. If it was a Pass- 
over, or if there was another Passover which John does not 
expressly mention, then the duration of His ministry was 

1 Thus, there was an interval of several months, at least, between the 
return of Jesus to Galilee (John iv. 3), and His departure to Jerusalem 
(v. 1); and there is an interval prior to the Feast of Tabernacles (vii. 2), 
during which “he walked in Galilee” (vii. 1). According to John 


(vii. 41), it was asked at Jerusalem, by way of objection: “Shall Christ 
come out of Galilee?” Cf. John vii. 52. 


340 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


three and a half years. The Synoptists refer to no Pass- 
over in explicit terms, after the commencement of the 
Saviour’s public ministry. But they definitely imply that 
at least one such Passover occurred (Luke vi. 1): the 
ripened harvest determines the time. They imply a re- 
peated and prolonged ministry in Judea (Matt. xxviii. 57 
seq.; Luke xxiii. 50 seq.; Mark xv. 42 seq.; Luke x. 38; 
Luke xxiii. 34, Matt. xxiii. 37). 

Luke begins the narrative of what purports to be the 
final departure of Christ from Galilee, preceding the cruci- 
fixion, at ὁ. ix., ver. 51. The interval between this passage 
and xviii. 14, is filled up with matter not contained in the 
other Synoptists,—matter “as a whole wanting in exact 
chronological arrangement,” * and relating to other portions 
of the Saviour’s ministry, as well as to that included in the 
final journey from Galilee to Jerusalem. The existence of 
this body of matter which does not find a fit place in the 
scheme which tacitly assumes but one jcurney from Galilee 
to a Passover, tends to corroborate the longer chronology 
of John. 

When we examine other leading features in the history, 
which both the Synoptists and the Fourth Gospel refer to, 
we find no reason to distrust the statements of the latter. 
For example, the narrative, in John, of the temporary con- 
nection of Jesus with several of His disciples, immediately 
after His baptism, explains, what would otherwise be diffi- 
cult to understand, their instant compliance with His call 
to drop their occupations, and form a permanent connection 
with Him. The exasperation of the Pharisees, and their 
determination to inflict death upon Jesus without delay, are 
accounted for, in this Gospel, by the extraordinary effect on 
the popular mind, of the miracle at the grave of Lazarus. 
But there is a rectification of the Synoptists in minor par- 


1 Robinson, Harmony, p. 199, 


JOHN AND THE SYNOPTISTS. 341 


ticulars, an entire independence, and fearlessness of contra- 
diction, which show that the writer was haunted by no fear 
that his authority would be questioned. Nothing can be 
more unlike the temper in which a falsifier would go to 
his work. There is no attempt to dovetail his narrative 
into the older and universally acknowledged histories. ὦ 
This characteristic of the Fourth Gospel renders it im- 
possible to account for its composition by any other than 
the Apostle, and baffles every attempt to explain how it 
could have been received by the churches, if it had not been 
known to emanate from him. 

The miracles recorded by John do not differ in their 
general character from those which are described by the 
Synoptists. The turning of water into wine involves no 
greater control of spirit over matter, no more stupendous 
exertion of supernatural power, than the feeding of the five 
thousand which is narrated in the other Gospels. 

The Tiibingen critics accuse the author of the Fourth 
Gospel of attributing to the disciples and others an incredi- 
ble misunderstanding of the words of Christ. Nicodemus 
thinks that He is speaking of a literal birth (John iii. 4). 
The Jews were at a loss to see how He could give them 
His flesh to eat (vi. 52). When He spoke of the “sleep” 
of Lazarus, He was taken literally, though the reference 
was to his death (xi. 11). But the same tropical style, and 
the same want of comprehension in His hearers, is fully 
exemplified in the reports of the Synoptists. When He 
spoke of “the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees” 
(Matt. xvi. 6), they thought it was because they had “taken 
no bread.” His direction to sell their garment and buy 


1 As an instance, see John xii. 2-9, compared with Matt. xxvi. 6-14. 
The variations of the narrative in John would be quite needless, on the 
supposition that they were the product of invention, 


342 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


a sword was construed as a literal command to provide 
themselves with weapons (Luke xxii. 36). 

Looking at the style of the discourses recorded in this — 
Gospel, we find them to be in a different vein from the 
more easily remembered gnomes and parables which make 
up the Galilean tradition. But, first, it cannot reasonably 
be thought that Jesus uniformly, especially in private 
converse with His disciples, or when speaking at Jerusa- 
lem, uttered Himself in apothegms and parables. There 
are striking instances, in the Synoptists, of utterances in 
the precise manner of the Johannine reports. The most 
marked example of this kind is in Matt. xi. 27 (Luke x. 
22). Secondly, the resemblance in the style of the dis- 
courses to the style of the other portions of the book im- 
plies only that these teachings of Christ had been assimi- 
lated, and reproduced, it might be in a condensed form, 
in the language of the Evangelist ; and this is no more 
than might be expected from his peculiar character as 
disclosed in this book, and from the length of time that had 
elapsed since he had heard them. This freedom in ex- 
pression is reconcilable with substantial fidelity in the re- 
ports given by the Evangelist of the Lord’s teaching. The 
accuracy of the Apostle’s recollection is, now and then, 
strikingly, because incidentally, revealed ; as in the expres- 
sion, “‘ Arise, let us go hence” (xiy. 31), which meets us in 
the midst of the discourse of Jesus to His disciples prior to 
His arrest. If we suppose that at this point they left the 
table, and that the Evangelist remembered this fact, the 
expression becomes intelligible. Otherwise it has no mean- 
ing. * 

The two or three places in which the Evangelist passes, 

1 Τῇ John ii. 19 are the words of Jesus: “ Destroy this temple, and in 


three days I will raise it up.” This must have been said by Him: it 
accounts for the accusation in Matt. xxyi. 61. 


JOHN AND THE SYNOPTISTS. 343 


without advertisement to the reader, from a report of the 
language of others, out into the stream of his own reflec- 
tions, are an indication of fidelity ; since one who was in- 
venting a narrative would not be so absorbed in the subject- 
matter as to neglect to mark the transition. 

In most cases the earliest and strongest impressions of 
the evangelical history are gained from the first three Gos- 
pels. The brief, pointed sayings of Jesus, which at the 
outset were most easily remembered, and for this reason 
formed the principal part of the stock of the Galilean tra- 
dition, make the same sort of impression now. ‘The naive 
style, often pathetic in its simplicity, of the Synoptists, 
meets all minds alike. It is for this reason that many ap- 
proach John’s Gospel with the conception of Christ’s teach- 
ing and life which has been stamped upon them as a con- 
sequence of their familiarity with the first three. But when 
these are critically studied, the estimate of their character 
is modified. The impossibility of making out a chronolo- 
gical order for many of the events and sayings which they 
record, the great brevity of their reports of conversations 
and interviews, which in many cases must have been ex- 
tended, the frequent discrepancies, in the form at least, 
which the several narratives exhibit, when compared with 
each other, show that, as histories, they are quite incom- 
plete. It should occasion no surprise, then, if we find an- 
other Gospel, written from a different point of view, a more 
consecutive narrative, which fills up gaps in the Synoptical 
tradition, and provides supplementary matter which that 
tradition would not so easily or naturally take up. We 
should not say an exaggerated estimate of the Synoptical 
Gospels, for that would be impossible, but an estimate in 
some respects incorrect of their real structure, an estimate 
which fails to observe their limitations, is often at the root 
of the suspicion with which the Fourth Gospel is regarded. 


344 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


The catholic spirit of the Fourth Gospel, is made an 
objection to the Johannine authorship. But difficulties of 
this nature, raised by Keim, and other writers of the same 
school, are largely of their own making. First, they frame 
to themselves a conception of the Apostolic age, in which 
John appears in the character of a Judaizer, instead of 
having given to Paul, as the Apostle to the Gentiles him- 
self declares, the right hand of fellowship. Then they infer 
that he could not have attained to the catholic and spiritual 
tone which belongs to this Gospel. Starting from false pre- 
mises, they land in an equally false conclusion. Secondly, 
they underrate the inevitable effect upon the Apostle’s mind 
of the events which had gradually placed an impassable 
barrier between Judaism and Christianity, and the influence 
of a residence of not far from a score of years in the midst 
of a Gentile community. The lessons of Providence blended 
with the teaching of the Spirit. Thirdly, the imputation 
that the Fourth Gospel attributes to Christ a condemnation 
of the Mosaic Law, or an antagonism to the Old Testament 
system, has no better support than perverse and mistaken 
exegesis. The spiritual character of the religion of the 
Gospel is set forth in Matthew, as well as in John; and in 
connection with the most emphatic statement of this truth 
in the Fourth Gospel, occurs the assertion that “Salvation 
is of the Jews” (Johniy, 22). It is objected that the assu- 
rance of Jesus to the woman of Samaria that worship is 
to be spiritual, and not confined to the temple, could not 
have been uttered at that early day. But how far does this 
saying go beyond the declaration of Jesus, which is reported 
by Matthew (xii. 6), that “one greater than the temple is 
here” ? It must be remembered that words of Jesus which 
made little impression on the Disciples at the moment, were 
recalled at a later day, and their true force discerned. 

It is not true that the theology of the prologue, or of 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 345 


the rest of the Gospel, is that of Philo. In Philo the 
Logos stands in connection with a complex system of in- 
termediate Powers, and oscillates between a person and 
an abstraction. The system of Philo is dualistic. An 
incarnation of the Logos—the doctrine that the Word be- 
came Flesh—clashes with the essential principles of his 
scheme, according to which matter is the source of evil, 
and the divine can have no contact with the earthly. Now 
we know that Cerinthus, who was of the Alexandrian 
school, trained in Egypt, brought forward the Judeo- 
Gnostic doctrine—a natural product of that school—that 
Christ did not really become incarnate, that Christ and 
Jesus were two, brought together at the baptism, and 
parting at the crucifixion. This doctrine, in its funda- 
mental notion, the First Epistle of John repudiates. It 
is Cerinthus, according to the early ecclesiastical tradition, 
whose opinions John tacitly opposes in the Gospel. Ex- 
ternal and internal evidence combine in favor of this 
opinion. Instead of the Evangelist being an Alexandrian, 
therefore, it is Alexandrian speculations which he combats. 

The central doctrine of John that the Word was made 
Flesh, ought to be sufficient to confute the charge of Dual- 
ism brought against this Gospel. The conception of matter 
as inherently evil is foreign to the mind of its author. 
The antithesis of light and darkness is moral, not physi- 
cal or necessary, in every passage where it appears. Men 
are in darkness because they dove darkness rather than 
light (John iii. 19). The Jews who were hostile to Jesus are 
called children of the Devil, obviously in an ethical sense 
as every one must see who compares the passages in the 
Gospel with corresponding statements in the First Epis- 
tle (1 John iii. 8, 12).} That anything else is meant, that 
there is any reference to a “father of Satan,” a Gnostic 


"See Meyer, in loco. 


346 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Demiurge, is one of the strange freaks of interpretation 
which it is hardly requisite to notice. 

That John had a certain impression of the person and 
office of Christ, and that he enunciates this faith at the 
outset, in glowing words, does not imply, in the slightest 
degree, an intention to depart from historical verity in 
the narrative which follows. Matthew, too, has a thesis, 
that Jesus is the Christ. Mark begins by declaring that 
He is the Christ, the Son of God. Neither of them isa 
neutral, uninterested chronicler. Both are believers, and 
for this reason they are moved to write. The question in 
the case of the Fourth Evangelist, as respecting the other 
two, is whether his impression relative to Jesus was of 
subjective origin, or the effect of that historical manifesta- 
tion, objective and real, which he had beheld. Did the 
idea beget the history, or the history the idea? 

There is a fundamental unity in the conception of the 
person of Christ in the various books of the New Testa- 
ment. This does not always appear on the surface, but it 
underlies the various representations of His person and 
work. In the Synoptists, the exalted nature of Christ is 
the silent postulate of the descriptions which are given of 
His relation to the World as its Judge, and of the glory 
that invests Him in this character. In the Epistles of 
Paul, His pre-existence and His relation to the world are 
set forth in terms which are the equivalent of those in 
which John embodies the same truth." 

It has been confidently asserted that the Apocalypse and 
the Fourth Gospel cannot be by the same Author. But if 
it be true that John had lived fifteen or twenty years in a 
Greek-speaking community, after writing the Revela- 
tion, and considering the different mood and the diversity 
of circumstances under which the books were produced, is 


1 See 1 Cor. viii. 6; 2 Cor. viii. 9; Phil. ii. 6. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 347 


there ground for that assertion? As to the theology of the 
two works, there is not that disparity which has frequently 
been affirmed to exist. On the contrary, there are striking 
affinities of thought, and phraseology. Jesus is expressly 
called in the Revelation, ‘the Word of God”—o λόγος τοῦ 
ϑεοῦ (Rey. xix. 13). He is very often designated as the 
Lamb, as in John i. 29; the only difference being that 
in the Apocalypse the diminutive (ἀγνέον) is used. 
Baur, the leader of the attack upon the genuineness of the 
Gospel in recent times, has remarked upon the points of 
resemblance which render the Gospel a kind of spiritual- 
ized Apocalypse. Which is the more probable, that this 
relation is due to a development of the Apostle’s thought 
and feeling, or to the elaborate artifice of an imitator? 
Why should an imitator neglect the obvious, salient fea- 
tures of his model, and aim to incorporate more occult 
qualities of thought and language, which it requires a criti- 
eal attention to identify? But if it were made clear that 
the Apostle could not have written both works; then, not- 
withstanding the attestation of Justin Martyr and Irenus, 
the Apocalypse would have to be ascribed to another,— 
perhaps, John the Presbyter, the contemporary of the 
Apostle at Ephesus. This book is not included in the 
Peschito—the old Syriac version,—and it is apparently not 
accepted by the author of the Muratorian canon. The evi- 
dence for the Johannine authorship of the Gospel, both 
external and internal, is much stronger than for the tradi- 
tional view as to the authorship of the Apocalypse. 

It is worthy of note that the Apocalypse makes mention 
of a germinant Gnosticism in the churches of Asia Minor ; 
a phenomenon similar to that which is noticed by Paul in the 
Epistle to the Colossians, written a few years earlier. The 
First Epistle of John brings to light the existence of the 


1 Gesch. ἃ. drei erst. Jahrhunderten, p. 147. 


348 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


same error in a riper form; and this error, too, the Gospel, 
not in a polemical way, but incidentally, condemns. 

One objection to the Johannine authorship of the Fourth 
Gospel is based on the alleged disparity between the spirit 
of John, who in conjunction with his brother received the 
name of Boanerges—a spirit which is supposed to be manifest 
in the A pocalypse—and the tone of the Gospel. But we know 
little of John apart from what we learn through his wri- 
tings. Vehemence, especially in the defence of friends, is 
often coupled with an affectionate and contemplative turn 
of mind. The First Epistle, which in various ways, 
affords proof of the genuineness of the Gospel, both being 
evidently from the same pen, exhibits an energy and occa- 
sional severity quite in keeping with the title given to 
John, and consonant with passages in the Apocalypse.' 
The First Epistle, at the same time, gives the same empha- 
sis to Love that forms a distinguishing feature of the 
Gospel. 

The indirect manner in which the Author of the Fourth 
Gospel discloses himself carries in it marks of sincerity and 
truth which it is hard to resist. The circumstance that, 
unlike the other New Testament writers, he does not speak 
of John “the Baptist,” but omits this appellation, is most 
easily explained on the supposition that the Author naturally 
would not distinguish himself from another of the same 
name, who was, also, his former teacher. But the mode in 
which John the Apostle is introduced, without the mention 
of his name, indicates that the Author is speaking of him- 
self. There is a kind of modesty, a sensitive feeling, which 
it is most unnatural to regard as the trick of a forger. 
“One of the two which heard John speak, and followed 
him, was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother.” Why is not 
the other of the two named? What other reason than be- 


1 See 1 John, i. 6, 10, ii. 11, 22, iii. 8, iv. 20, v. 10. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 349 


cause it was he who was writing the narrative, John hin. 
self? Is this the mode which a falsarius who wished to 
palm off his book as the work of John, would adopt to 
secure his end? It would not only be contrary to all pre: 
cedent in apocryphal literature; it would be contrary ta 
nature. 

“Through the whole Fourth Gospel,” says Hase, “ while 
the Apostle John is never named, there moves an unnamed, 
as it were, veiled form, which sometimes comes forward, yet 
without the veil being entirely lifted. It is inconceivable 
that the Author should not have known, or did not care to 
know, who this Disciple was, whom Jesus loved, who, at 
the last Supper, leaned upon His breast, who with Peter 
followed after Jesus when He was taken by the soldiers, 
who received his mother as a legacy from Him, who again 
with Peter first hurries to the grave of the Risen One. 
There must, therefore, be some sort of special relation of 
the Author to this person; there must have been a reason 
for not naming him. How natural to suppose that he 
designates himself with that name which expresses the 
highest contents and the whole joy of his life—as ‘that 
Disciple whom Jesus loved!’ The objection of Weisse that 
this would have been an arrogant assumption shows that he 
has not entered into that joyous pride, mingled with all 
humility, which grows out of the consciousness of having 
been loved, without desert on his part, by Him who is the 
object of his own supreme love. In the Synoptical Gos- 
pels, also, John appears, in connection with Peter, as an 
intimate and trusted Disciple; he is reckoned by Paul 
among the ‘pillar’ Apostles, the heads of the Church at 
Jerusalem; in the Ephesian tradition, he is the “disciple 
who leaned on the breast of the Lord.” ' 

While the writer thus signifies who he is, he also dis- 


1 Hase, Geschichte Jesu, (1875), p. 48. 


350 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


tinctly, yet not obtrusively, represents himself as an eye- 
witness of the circumstances which he relates. With regard 
to one occurrence only, which was astonishing to himself, 
and which he felt might be equally so to others, does he 
formally aver this to be the fact (J ohn xix. 35). 

Let us see how this profession of authorship, so clearly 
yet so modestly intimated, is sustained by certain personal 
characteristics which pertain to the book. 

First, this Gospel is the work of one writer. The 24th 
verse of the last chapter is probably an independent testi- 
mony appended to the book by those to whose hands it was 
first committed. The passage on the woman taken in 
adultery (viii. 1-12) is not a part of the original text, but 
was early introduced into the work from some other source. 
It may be authentic history, but it was not in the Gospel 
as it came from the hands of its author. These passages 
excepted, this Gospel, from beginning to end, emanates 
from one mind and one pen. ΑἸ] hypotheses which would 
assume a composite authorship are shut out by the most 
conclusive internal evidence. Hither the Apostle, or some 
other person—at all events, a single individual—wrote the 
book. 

Secondly, it was written, so to speak, at one heat. There 
is no combination of documents, no compilation of mate- 
rials collected from different quarters, and connected, or 
fused, in one composition. There is such a vital unity, 
such a continuity and flow, as prove incontestably, that, 
whatever previous reflection there may have been, there 
was one act of production. There is no trace of slow, ela- 
borate contrivance of the kind that belongs to an artificial 
work.' The progress of the narrative and the relation of 


1 Professor Holtzmann has undertaken to show (Zeitschrift f. wissen- 
schaftl, Theol., 1869, 1, 2, 4), that phrases are culled here and there from 
Luke and other writers, and that the work is made up in this artificial way. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 351 


its parts to one another show it to be one living whole. As 
Hase has said, it is seamless, like the garment of Christ. 
Thirdly, the Author was a Jew by birth, but not an 
Alexandrian. It has often been denied that he was a Jew. 
He speaks of “the Jews,” it is said, in such a manner as 
to indicate that he was not one of them. But considering 
the time when the Gospel was written, and those for whom 
it was immediately designed, this is not unnatural. The 
Jewish nationality and the temple alike lay in ruins. The 
destruction of Jerusalem, in conjunction with the events 
that preceded and followed it, effectually separated the body 
of Christians from the stock of Israel, and developed the 
antagonism of the Jews to the new faith and to all of its 
adherents. Paul, in his 1st Epistle to the Thessalonians, 
which was written as early as A. D. 53, speaks of the severe 
persecutions which the churches of Judea had suffered from 
their Jewish countrymen. The murder of James, the 
brother of the Lord, preceded the siege of Vespasian, when 
the Christians withdrew to Pella, separating their fortunes 
from those of their Jewish countrymen. In the period that 
elapsed before the composition of the Gospel, this bitter 
antagonism on the part of the Jews had not been 
softened. Christianity had acquired its full independence. 
Under these circumstances, and addressing a community pre- 
dominantly made up of Gentiles, the Apostle John might 
naturally designate his former countrymen as “ the Jews,”" 
But the evidence of the Jewish extraction of the writer of 
this Gospel is convincing. He is acquainted with the 


No book can be more unlike a piece of mosaic whose parts are cemented 
together in this fashion. Every such theory, independently of the pre- 
carious instances adduced in support of it, is psychologically incom- 
patible with the patent characteristics of the book. 

1 This phraseology is not confined to John; it is found in other Ju- 
daic Apostles: see Matt. xxviii. 15; 1 Cor. i, 28; 2 Cor. xi. 24; 1 Thess, 
ii. 14. 


352 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Hebrew Scriptures in the original text. This indicates that 
he was not an Alexandrian. He shows a familiarity with 
the geography and customs of the Holy Land, which proves 
that he had resided there. If he speaks of a Bethany beyond 
the Jordan—the true reading for ‘“ Bethabara”’—he does 
not mistake the Bethany spoken of by the other Evangel- 
ists, the location of which he elsewhere correctly states ; 
and it is much more reasonable to suppose that an old town 
has passed away, or an old name of a place has been 
changed, than that a writer, who shows himself so accu- 
rately informed, has erred wilfully or through mistake. 
Of the topography at the opening of ch. iv., Renan says, 
that none but a Jew of Palestine who had often passed 
into the valley of Sichem, could have written it. He 
knows that one must descend, to go from Cana to Caper- 
naum (iv. 47).2 If he speaks of a high-priest “for that 
year,” it was not because he thought the office an annual 
one, but on account of the supreme importance which 
“that year”’ of the trial and crucifixion of Jesus had in his 
mind. There is no need to dwell on such points, since the 
most intelligent opponents of the Johannine authorship at 
present attach no weight to these alleged archeological 
difficulties on which Baur and others formerly laid so 
much stress.2 The language and style of the Fourth 
Gospel are pervaded with evidences that the Author was a 
Hebrew by birth and by culture. This is the verdict of 
Ewald and of other scholars who are most competent to pro- 
nounce a judgment on that question. The Hebrew extrac- 
tion and education of the writer of this Gospel are conceded 
by Keim. 

Fourthly, we call attention once more to the latent con- 

1 Vie de Jésus (18th ed.), p. 493. 


2 Cf, Godet, Comment sur ? Evang. de S. Jean, (2d ed.), p. 126. 
> Keim, Gesch. Jesu, p. 183; Mangold, Theol. Literaturzeit., 1866, p. 361. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN, 353 


sciousness of authvrity that belongs to the Author of this 
Gospel—authority, we mean, as a historian. Heis one who 
enjoys a credit that delivers him from all consciousness of 
exposure to contradiction. How else shall we account for the 
scheme of his work? The Saviour’s ministry is exhibited 
as continuing for upwards of three years. The other Gos- 
pels, the recognized authorities with which he was not 
unacquainted, apparently limited its duration to a year and 
a half. Here, then, is a bold deviation from what had 
come to be the prevailing conception of the length of the 
Saviour’s ministry. Moreover, Judea as well as Galilee is 
made the theatre of that ministry. There is no conceivable 
purpose which a forger might not have accomplished with- 
out laying himself open to the charge of contradicting, in 
this particular, the accredited Evangelists. Why present 
this gratuitous provocation to doubt and denial? [5 this 
natural to one who is doubtful of his own credit, of one 
who is simulating the character of an Apostle? The same 
sort of independence which belongs to the general plan, ex- 
tends to the details, of the work. To take a single instance. 
Matthew describes the scourging of the money-changers 
from the temple. He makes it occur in connection with 
the Passover when Christ was betrayed and crucified. The 
Fourth Evangelist records the same or a like event, 
but places it at the beginning of the Saviour’s ministry. 
It is possible that the same act was done twice; first, at that 
time, and once more just before the Saviour’s death. Or, 
it may be that, as the Galilean tradition included a descrip- 
tion of but one Passover, and that the last, this event, which 
took place at an earlier festival of the same kind, is intro- 
duced by Matthew out of its chronological place. But, 
whatever explanation is adopted, the writer of the Fourth 
Gospel, by placing this transaction at the beginning of the 
Saviour's public work, and by uot intimating that auotber 
23 


354 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


transaction like it took place at the end, exposed himself to 
the imputation of differing from the other Evangelists. 
What motive could a falsifier have for thus exciting suspi- 
cion against himself needlessly ? Why not fall in with the 
current representation and belief, instead of venturing to 
misdate this marked occurrence? No satisfactory solution 
of this difficulty is possible. The candid student must feel 
that the writer had a conscious and acknowledged authority 
among Christians, which lifted him above the fear that his 
statements would be disbelieved, however diverse they 
might seem to be from those of the other Evangelists. In 
one place, after describing certain events which the other 
Evangelists do not relate, he does throw in the explanation 
that “John was not yet cast into prison” (John iii. 24). 
This shows that he was not unaware of that frame-work of 
the Saviour’s ministry which belongs to the Synoptical 
narratives. Hemakes here a chronological remark for the 
information of his readers. Notwithstanding this acquaint- 
ance on his part with the accepted tradition, he proceeds 
with the utmost independence, taking no pains to harmon- 
ize his narrations with those of the Synoptists. Such a 
course on the side of a falsifier, who would naturally wish 
to disarm suspicion, is utterly inexplicable. 

5. The Author of the Fourth Gospel manifests a “ his- 
torical consciousness.” That is to say, hts attitude of mind 
in reference to Jesus, and to the facts of His life which he 
undertakes to record, is the opposite of that of a romancer. 

It is true that he has a definite idea of the person and 
office of Christ, and this he expresses at the outset, applying 
to Him aterm which had become widely current, partly 
through the influence of the Alexandrian Judaism. He is 
the Logos—the Revealer and Mediator. It is true that 
this Gospel is not without a plan and an orderly progress. 
The growing faith of the disciples appears in contrast with 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 355 


the unbelief and increasing hostility of the Jews. The 
theme is set forth in the plaintive words: “ He came unto 
His own, and His own received Him not.’ Moreover, 
there was an end for which the book was written, namely, 
that those to whom it was given might believe in Jesus and 
have the blessing of a spiritual life (xix. 35, xx. 81). But 
a history, in order to be authentic, has no need to be either 
aimless or planless. Its credibility is not impaired by the 
circumstance that its author follows a coherent plan, and has 
a particular motive, not unworthy, for preparing it. The 
only question is whether the actual course of events was in 
accordance with the record. 

That the author had a genuine historical feeling, that 
he is not clothing theological ideas in a garb of fiction, 
is obvious, first, from the numerous statements which 
have no other than a historical value, and which are 
brought in simply for the reason that the facts contained 
in them were remembered. Some of them disclose un- 
mistakably the autoptic character of the narration. The 
particular mention of the time of the occurrence of events, 
as in John x. 21—“‘and it was winter,”—the designation 
of localities, as when it is said that John was baptizing at 
“ 7Enon near to Salim,” that Jesus went to the Mount of 
Olives, and returned to Jerusalem in the morning (viii. 1), 
that certain words were uttered by Him in “the treasury ” 
(viii. 20) ; that a pool at Jerusalem was near the sheep-gate 
(v. 2); that the judgment-seat of Pilate is called the Pave- 
ment, but in the Hebrew “ Gabbatha” (xix. 13); that Philip 
was of Bethsaida in Galilee (xii. 21); and parenthetical 
references like that to the anointing of Christ by Mary 
(xi. 2), before the incident had been narrated, are instances 
of unconscious historical fidelity. The fulness with which 
the testimony of John the Baptist is given—who, as we have 
before observed, is called John, without the addition of the 


306 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


appellation, the Evangelist John being himself the narrator 
—is natural for one who had been his disciple. It was 
probably due, also, to the fact that adherents of John still 
existed as a sect, whom the Evangelist sought, by an ap- 
peal to facts within his recollection, to convince that he 
whom they followed was not the true Light, but only the 
forerunner and witness. It is often said that the recogni- 
tion of Jesus as “the Lamb of God,” by the Baptist, would 
imply a stage of knowledge higher than he had attained 
to,—would be, in short, an anachronism. But there is 
nothing impossible in a prophetic glimpse of this sort,— 
a momentary elevation, it might be, above his ordinary 
idea of the Messiah. Nor would a view of this kind, 
suggested by the recollection of a passage in Isaiah (liii.7), 
be psychologically inconsistent with the fact of his wavering 
for a moment, at a later day, in his confidence in the 
Messianic character of Jesus, when no tidings reached him 
in his prison of a demonstration on the part of Christ, such 
as, on the ordinary plane of his thoughts, he was in the 
habit of expecting. 

The Fourth Gospel brings to light personal character, 
sometimes by a few, unobtrusive touches, and in a way to 
inspire confidence in the fidelity of the narrative. The 
account of the Woman of Samaria is an example. Nicode- 
mus is thrice referred to. First, he comes to Jesus by 
night, a sincere but unsatisfied and timid inquirer (John 
ili. 1). Ata later day (John vii. 50, 51), he has acquired 
sufficient courage to remonstrate against the injustice of 
condemning Jesus unheard. Finally (John xix. 3), he 
comes boldly with his myrrh and aloes to do the last offices 
of affection to the body of Jesus. 

But the main thing in the historical consciousness of 
this Evangelist, is yet to be mentioned. The soul of the 
Writer is animated by a faith and love, of which Jesus is 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 357 


the source and object. This is manifest almost in every 
line both of the Gospel and Epistle. He professes to believe 
on account of what he had seen. ‘‘ We have beheld his 
glory ” (John i. 14); “That which we have heard, which 
we have seen with our eyes” (1 Johni. 1). The genesis 
and growth of his faith, and of that of his companions, 
were indissolubly connected with the teachings and mira- 
cles which he records. How often, after one of these 
records—for example, after the account of the miracle at 
Cana (ii. 11)—it is added that His disciples believed. 
The Evangelist shows what it was, and why it was, that 
he and his companions believed, although Jesus was re- 
jected by so many. The roots of that inward experience 
which was his life and joy, were in these transactions that 
he is induced to relate in order that others may share with 
him the spiritual blessing. There is'thus an autobiographic 
element which runs through the narrative.’ It opens with 
an explanation of the way in which the writer was directed 
to Jesus by John the Baptist. It is the origin and secret 
of his own faith which he will describe. [5 this profession 
of faith in Jesus hypocritical? Or was the source of that 
faith anything different from what the Evangelist asserts it 
to have been? Take away the verity of the history, and 
you have no account to give of that religious life which 
sprang out of it. 

The author of the Fourth Gospel had a personal love to 
Jesus. He was not only the disciple whom Jesus loved ; 
he was the disciple who loved Jesus. If there is any such 
thing as sincerity in the world, this fact is manifest. He 
loved the Master, as Grotius has said, not simply as the 
Messiah, but with a warm personal affection, as one friend 
loves another. How did he acquire this love? Does not 
this history give a true answer to the question? Is it 


1See Godet, Comment. sur. ? Evang. de S. Jean (2d ed.), Intr. p. 110. 


358 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


credible that one who felt this love to Jesus, which must 
have been awakened by a knowledge of His life, that was 
acquired somewhere—is it credible that one thus bound to 
Jesus by the strongest ties of love and reverence, would 
have deliberately set to work to falsify the whole history 
of His life among men? [5 it credible that he would have 
deserted and cast aside the evangelical documents, from 
which, if from anywhere, his love to Jesus had been kin- 
dled, and have manufactured fictions in the room of them ? 
Verily the skeptical hypothesis makes a heavy draught 
on our credulity. 

If the Gospel of John be spurious, it has no parallel, as 
we have said before, in the apocryphal literature. If we 
examine the apocryphal Gospels which are extant, we shall 
see that they relate to the beginning, or to the close, of the 
Saviour’s life. The infancy and childhood of Jesus, the 
character and doings of His mother, are chosen as the field 
for the fantastic and silly tales of books like the Protevan- 
gelium of James, and the Gospel of Thomas. The Acta 
Pilati, in the various forms in which it is found, is an en- 
largement of the canonical narratives of the Saviour’s inter- 
course with the Roman Procurator; while the second part 
of the Gospel of Nicodemus, in its different forms, treats of 
the Descent of Christ into Hades. But there is no ex- 
ample of an attempt to traverse the whole ground of the 
evangelical history, to recast that sacred history according 
to a new chronological scheme, and, instead of amplifying 
or decorating the records of miracles in the canonical Evan- 
gelists, to substitute for them narratives entirely new. For 
example, an apocryphal writer, if he ventured at all upon 
the field occupied by the Evangelists, instead of introducing 
the narrative of the raising of Lazarus, would have con- 
nected his own fancies, or doctrinal notions, with a miracle 
already recorded and believed, as the resurrection of the 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 359 


son of the widow of Nain. Or he would have exercised his 
invention in a province only partially touched by the ca- 
nonical histories —a terra incognita—like the youth of Jesus. 
The Protevangelium ends thus: “‘ And I James that wrote 
this history in Jerusalem, a commotion having arisen when 
Herod died, withdrew myself to the wilderness until the 
commotion in Jerusalem ceased, glorifying the Lord God, 
who had given me the gift and the wisdom to write this 
history” (c. 25). So the Gospel of Thomas concludes: 
“After all these things I, Thomas, the Israelite, have 
written what I have seen, and have recounted them to the 
Gentiles, and to our brethren,” ete. (c. 15). This is the 
characteristic manner of the apocryphal writers. On the 
contrary, in the Fourth Gospel, the author modestly with- 
holds his name, which is assumed to be known to his read- 
ers, and is revealed only in an incidental way, as he nar- 
rates events in which he directly participated. If the book 
is spurious, there is involved a refinement in fraud without 
another example in this kind of literature. And then the 
success of the amazing fraud is equally without a parallel. 
The apocryphal Gospels never gained any general currency, 
or acknowledgment; for the Gospel of the Hebrews, 
which substantially corresponded to the canonical Matthew, 
is hardly to be reckoned among them, Can we believe that 
the Fourth Gospel which, if it be spurious, outstripped 
them all in audacity of invention, found no difficulty in se- 
curing a reception at the hands of the disciples of the 
Apostle John, of the churches of Asia, where he had 
taught, and which at the end of the first century we know 
to have been large and numerous, and of all the churches 
of the Roman world, so that not a lisp of contradiction or 
doubt respecting its genuineness is uttered by any ecclesi- 
astical writer of the second or third centuries. There was 
a question about the Epistle to the Hebrews, whether it 


360 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


was written by Paul, and whether, if written by one of his 
pupils, it ought to be adopted into the canon. There was 
a question about the Second Epistle of Peter, whether it 
was really composed by that Apostle." There were some 
of the churches apparently, which doubted the apostolic 
origin of the Apocalypse.” But this Gospel, so unique in its 
character, so likely to challenge dispute, if its authenticity 
were not assured beyond a peradventure, silently took its 
place by the side of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, with none 
to question its pretensions. 

If the Fourth Gospel was not written by John, it is a 
product of pious fraud. Among the Jews, in the later 
period of their history, prior to the birth of Christ, many 
pseudonymous works were composed. This was true 
mostly of the Alexandrians, but not of them exclusively. 
Authors, sensible that the age of inspiration had passed, and 
writing from no motive of literary ambition, embodied 
under the name of Solomon, or some other ancient worthy, 
the lessons which they thought adapted to the times. At 
first and often, this was a literary device, no deceit being 
intended. It early led, however, to intentional fraud. 
The same practice passed into those Christian circles where 
Judaism and Judaizing influences were potent. A distine- 
tion was made between esoteric and exoteric doctrine, 
between what the enlightened might hold, and what it was 
expedient to impart to the people,—a distinction which had 
its prime source in the Alexandrian philosophy. Under 
the cover of this false ethical principle, writings were fabri- 
cated like the Sibylline oracles, and the Pseudo-Clemen- 
tine Homilies. But pious frauds of this nature were pos- 
sible only where there was a defective sense of the obliga- 
tion of truth. They are utterly repugnant toa sound 
Christian feeling; nor is there ground for supposing that 


1 Eusebius, H. £., iii. 8. 2 Tbid., vii. 25. 


THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 361 


in the ancient church, generally speaking, they were re- 
garded otherwise than as at present. Speaking of one of 
these fabricated books, the Acta Pauli et Thecle, Tertul- 
lian says, that “‘in Asia the Presbyter who composed that 
writing, as if he were augmenting Paul’s name from his 
own store, after being convicted, and confessing that he 
had done it from love of Paul, was removed from office.”’! 
This act is indicative of the judgment that would be 
formed of such an imposture by Christians generally at 
that time. 

Whoever reads the Fourth Gospel can judge for himself 
whether the author stood on the low plane of the manufac- 
turers of apocryphal writings, or had a conscience suffi- 
ciently educated to perceive the really iniquitous character 
of this species of fraud. There is no doubt as to the im- 
pression which the Gospel has made, in this particular, on 
all the generations of Christian men who have lived since 
it was written. 

This Gospel, in respect to the power and elevation that 
characterize it, has nothing to approach it in the produc- 
tions of the post-apostolic age. Compare it with the 
Epistle of Polycarp, which is not wanting in earnestness, 
and not unworthy of a Christian pastor, and the heaven- 
wide superiority of the Author of the Gospel, to the A pos- 
tolic Fathers, becomes evident. There are some, to be sure, 
in our day, who complain of the “ monotony ” of this Gos- 
pel, and are little impressed by it, Far different has been 
the verdict of multitudes of every grade of intelligence and 
culture ; including gifted men as diverse from one another 
as Clement of Alexandria, Martin Luther, and the histo- 
rian Niebuhr. 

The question arises, then, why should a man of this ac- 
knowledged power—supposing the author not to be John— 


1 De Baptismo, c. xvii. 


362 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


choose to skulk behind a mask? Why should he shrink 
from the open advocacy of his theological tenets, in the face 
of his contemporaries, none of whom would be a match for 
him? Who was the great. Unknown, who eclipses all the 
writers about him, but continues to keep his very existence 
unsuspected ? 

And if we can imagine that such a man would resort to 
a trick of this kind, how did he escape detection? How 
did he escape even a suspicion unfavorable to his false and 
fraudulent claim? 

From whatever side we contemplate the problem, it be- 
comes more and more manifest, as Neander has said, that 
this Gospel, if it be not the work of the Apostle John, is 
an insoluble enigma.} 


1 Plant. and Train. of the Ch., p. 371. 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. HISTORIES. 363 


CHAPTER ΧΙ. 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE NEW TESTAMENT HIS- 
TORIES. 


THE Geologist points to ancient sea-beaches, now ele- 
vated above the reach of the tide, and to terraces on the 
margin of rivers, which mark the level to which the waters 
have risen at different epochs in the past. They are monu- 
ments which nature has left of the successive periods in 
her own history. In like manner do literary productions 
exhibit indelible traces of the time and circumstances under 
which they were produced. Emphatically is this true of 
works which deal with things in the concrete, whether it 
be outward occurrences, or changing institutions and phases 
of opinion. Hence the circumstances under which a book 
was composed will leave their impress upon it. The most 
cunning hand is scarcely equal to the task of carrying 
through a deception, unless criticism slumbers. Anachron- 
isms will infallibly creep into the counterfeited work, and 
betray its artificial origin. Therefore, characteristics of 
the kind specified serve as a criterion of the genuineness 
of books, which is independent of external testimony, and 
has a convincing force for the reason that such peculiari- 
ties are plainly not the product of contrivance. They are 
too deeply woven into the texture of the work. They 
are introduced with no consciousness, on the part of 
writers, of their bearing on questions of date and author- 
ship. They constitute, as it were, the atmosphere that sur- 


364 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


rounds a literary production. They tell a tale, like pecu- 
liarities of language and accent. ‘Thou art a Galilean: 
thy speech bewrayeth thee,” was the remark of the servant 
to Peter. With a like certainty literary fraud will unmask 
itself, from the impossibility of assuming the features of 
verity to which I have referred. 

The New Testament histories abound in references, 
many of them quite casual, to customs, manners, incidents, 
geographical and political facts—to a myriad aspects of so- 
ciety —which identify the time when the books were written. 
Besides a great variety of circumstauces of this general na- 
ture, there are certain other internal peculiarities, which 
are less obvious, since they do not lie on the surface, but 
which point convincingly to one conclusion—that which 
affirms the genuineness, or early date, of the books to which 
they pertain. These considerations are not all of equal 
weight in their bearing on the different historical books of 
the New Testament ; but the proper discriminations can be 
made as we proceed. 

I, We call attention to the hopes and expectations of 
the Apostles respecting the Second Advent of Christ, as 
they are disclosed in the New Testament writings. It is 
clear that the Disciples, during the life-time of their Mas- 
ter, notwithstanding the spirituality that belonged to them, 
when compared with their countrymen generally, shared in 
the prevalent expectation of a Messianic kingdom to be in- 
augurated in visible might and majesty. The impression 
made on their hearts by the moral and religious teaching of 
Christ, the personal attraction which He exerted upon them, 
in conjunction with the miracles which left them in no 
doubt as to His divine mission and the resources of His 
power, held them in their loyalty to Him, when others, 
their sanguine hopes of an external demonstration being dis- 
appointed, forsook Him. But the Disciples, the chosen com- 


WATER- MARKS OF AGE IN THE N.T. HISTORIES. 365 


pany, were so firmly wedded to their old conception of the 
kingdom that they could not be made to believe that Christ 
was to suffer and die. His reiterated intimations and assur- 
ances on this topic fell on deaf ears. If they attracted notice at 
all, it was only to call forth, as in the case of Peter, a zealous 
protest (Matt. xvi. 22, Mark viii. 32). When they saw 
Him die, a victim of the power and malice of the Jewish 
authorities, they “‘mourned and wept” (Mark xvi. 10), 
uot only for the personal bereavement which they had 
suffered, but from the apparent wreck of their hopes. 
The ambitious feeling which had prompted them, at 
an earlier day, to contend as rival aspirants for the prin- 
cipal posts of honor in the kingdom about to be ushered 
in, as they supposed, with imposing splendor, might 
dwindle, or disappear, under the Master’s pure teaching 
and example. But the underlying idea of a Messiah 
who was literally to sit upon the throne of David was 
more slowly surrendered. After His resurrection, they 
put the anxious question: “ Wilt Thou at this time, 
restore the kingdom to Israel?” That, as they imagined 
was the end and aim of His reappearance. It was the goal 
towards which their eyes were directed. With these ideas 
and aspirations, it was natural that they should dwell with 
eager interest upon His teaching relative to His second 
coming. Then, if not before, the glory of the Messiah 
would be fully displayed. This event was naturally the 
object of their fond anticipation. They stood gazing up 
into heaven. Their yearning for the absent Lord mingled 
itself with their conviction that the Messiah’s work was 
incomplete until there should be a stupendous manifesta- 
tion of power in connection with it. Every hour’s delay 
of His coming was a painful postponement of a wish that 
pined for its fulfilment. The day could not be distant 


1 Acts i. 6. 


366 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


when every eye would behold His glory; when they 
would rejoice once more in His visible presence. This ex- 
pectation is expressed by all of the Apostles in terms which 
fairly admit of no other interpretation. It is found in 
Paul (Rom. xiii. 11, 12; 1 Cor. vii. 29,31; x.11; Phil.iv.5; 
1 Tim. vi. 14). Itis true that in his Second Epistle to the 
Thessalonians, Paul cautions those to whom he is writing, 
against the notion, which had caused no little agitation 
among them, that Christ was to appear immediately (ii. 2, 3), 
but his language, at the same time, implies that the coming 
of the Lord is not far off; the preliminary signs were begin- 
ning to be seen (ii. 7,8). The same expectation is expressed 
in the Epistle to the Hebrews (Heb. x. 25, 37); in the Epis- 
tle of James (v. 3, 8); in the Epistles of Peter, (1 Peter iv. 
7, 2 Peter 111. 3); in the Epistle of Jude (ver. 18), in the 
First Epistle of John (ii. 18), and in the Apocalypse (i. 1, 
iii. 11, xxi. 7, 12, 20). To put any other construction on 
these passages, as if the Parusia to which they refer, were 
anything else than the Second Advent of the Lord to 
Judgment, would introduce a dangerous license in interpre- 
tation, and one which might be employed to subvert the 
principal doctrines of the Christian system.’ 

Under the general expectation of the Apostles, mistaken 


1 Prof. Lightfoot, on the Philippians, commenting on ch. iv. 5, says: 
“ΤῊ 6 nearness of the Lord’s Advent is assigned as a reason for patient 
forbearance. So similarly in St. James, v.8...... The expression, 
6 κύριος ἐγγὺς is the Apostle’s watchword. In 1 Cor. xvi an Aramaic 
equivalent is given, Μαρὰν 404, whence we may infer that it was a famil- 
iar form of recognition and warning in the early Church. Compare 
Barnab. 3 21 . . . . See also Luke xxi. 31, 1 Peter iv. 7.” Meyer, on 
Romans xiii. 11, says: ‘7 σωτηρία, das Messiasheil, that is, thought of in 
its perfection, as it comes in through the Parasia, which Paul, in com- 
mon with the whole Apostolic Church, conceived of as near and to come 
during the lifetime of that generation. Compare Phil. iv. 5; 1 Peter 
iv. 7.” 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. HISTORIES. 367 


though it might prove to be in the one particular of time, 
there lay a fundamental truth. The Apostle Paul, speaking 
of transgressions of the people of God under the old dispensa- 
tion, says (1 Cor. x. 11): ‘They are written for our admoni- 
tion upon whom the ends of the world ”’—of the ages, the last 
times of the world’s history—“are come.” On this pas- 
sage, Neander remarks: “ He regards the final catastrophe 
as near, and all the early history of the kingdom of God as 
having been recorded as an admonitory example for the 
last time. In this view, the Apostle was warranted, even 
though he held the Last Time to be much shorter than it 
was to be. Christianity is the goal and end of all earlier 
revelations, and no other revelation follows upon it. 
Herein is the right given to the Christian to consider him- 
self as the goal to which Revelation, in the whole previous 
course of its development, points and ministers.” ! 

When we turn to the teaching of Christ, we find, in the 
first place, that the time of the Second Advent and con- 
summation of the kingdom, He declares to be not a subject 
of Revelation. That day and hour were known neither to 
man nor angel, nor to the Son, but to the Father only 
(Matt. xxiv. 36; ef. Mark xiv. 32). It is doubtful whether 
this passage should be understood as relating solely to the 
precise point of time—the day of the month, and the hour 
of the day—when the event in question was to occur. The 
meaning may be that the time in general was known only 
to God. This is said in an unequivocal form, in the words 
of Christ to the Apostles, at a later day : “It is not for you 
to know the times and seasons, which the Father hath put 
in His own power ” (Acts i. 7), That event belonged to 
those future things into which human curiosity might not 
pry. They were to be learned, in particular the date of their 
occurrence was to be ascertained, only as the plan of Provi- 


1 Corintherbriefe, p. 164. 


368 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


dence should be unfolded to human eyes in actual history. 
It is worthy of remark that when the Apostle Paul utters 
recommendations which were prompted by his expectation 
of the Second Advent as near, he disclaims for them the 
authority derived from inspiration, and attaches to them 
no higher sanction than may be warranted by his own 
judgment as a man.’ Whatever he may hope and may 
think, he does not claim to know with certainty what has 
not been revealed, or to issue injunctions upon divine au- 
thority which have no higher source than his own personal 
convictions. 

In the second place, there is much of the teaching of 
Christ which implies a moral progress of the Gospel in. 
the world, to extend through a long period of time. This 
is the impression made, for example, by the general tone 
of the precepts of the Sermon on the Mount. We should 
gather from the words of Christ, on various occasions, that 
an influence has been set at work which is gradually to 
permeate society. He compares the future effect of Chris- 
tianity to that of leaven, which by degrees assimilates to 
itself the mass in which it is deposited. It is hidden in 
the dough, it is obscure, insignificant in quantity, but by a 
slow and silent operation it spreads through all the mea- 
sures of meal in which it is placed. He compares Chris- 
tianity, also, toa grain of mustard-seed—the least of all 
seeds—which grows into a tree affording lodgment to the 
birds of the air.” These illustrations point to something 
directly opposite to a speedy, abrupt, miraculous termina- 
tion to be put to the moral progress of Christian truth. 
In the same vein, Christ likens Himself to the farmer who 
sows the seed, and leaves it to spring up in its own time 
and way,—first the blade, then the ear, then the full 
corn in the ear. He bade the Apostles go forth, and 


‘ 1 Cor. vii. 25. 2 Matt. xiii. 31, 32. 5 Mark iv. 28. 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. HISTORIES. 369 


preach the Gospel to all nations.’ He foretold, as Mat- 
thew relates, that many would come from the East and 
from the West—from all quarters of the Gentile world 
—and find admission into His kingdom. In the Parable 
of the Wedding Feast, He warned His hearers that the 
destruction of Jerusalem would be the signal for the wide 
diffusion of the Gospel among the heathen.?, The messen- 
gers are to go to the highways and the hedges to procure 
guests for the Feast. In the Parable of the House- 
holder,? the husbandmen who kill his son, are to be 
themselves destroyed, and the vineyard is to be delivered 
to other husbandmen. To remove all doubts as to the 
meaning of the Parable, it is added : “The kingdom of God 
shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing 
forth the fruits thereof.” At the destruction of Jerusalem, 
the centre of the kingdom will pass over from the Jewish 
theocracy to the Christian Church. These are among the 
proofs that Christ anticipated a gradual progress of the 
Gospel on the earth, to be continued after the Jewish na- 
tion had been broken up. 

Nevertheless, the Apostles, as we have seen, cherished 
the hope and expectation that the Lord would soon return, 
—an expectation that was not extinguished by the disap- 
pointment of it in the first age of Christianity, but is ex- 
pressed in most of the Fathers of the second eentury ; for 
Origen, who died in 254, appears to have been the first to 
suggest that the Gospel by its own moral power, through 
the Spirit, would overcome heathenism in the Roman 
Empire. 

It is not strange that this expectation, which appears so 
distinctly and frequently in the Epistles, should tinge the 
phraseology in which the Evangelists record the prophetic 
utterances of Jesus. That a verbal exactitude belongs 


1 Matt. xxviii. 19. 2 Matt. xxii. 7-10. 3 Matt. xxi. 33-42. 
24 


370 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


always to these reports of the Saviour’s teaching is claimed 
by no intelligent person who has compared the Gospels 
with one another. Jesus taught in the Aramaic dialect ; 
His teaching was transmitted orally, for a time, before it 
was embodied in a written form; His sayings are often 
condensed by the Evangelists, and given in an order not 
corresponding precisely to that in which they were uttered.’ 

The Jews, in their habitual conceptions and language, 
drew a sharp line of division between the pre-Messianic 
and the Messianic times, between the present order of 
things (αἀύν οὗτος), and the order of things to follow the 
establishment of the Messiah’s kingdom (atwy ἐρχόμενος 
or μέλλων). This distinction appears everywhere in the 
New Testament. Hence, while the kingdom, in one 
sense, was present, and was actually introduced when 
Christ wore the form of a servant, and was on the earth 
with His disciples, it was nevertheless still to come. Its 
full manifestation, and its consummation, were in the 
future. The Advent of the Messiah was to be at the junc- 
tion of the two periods, at the close of the present Atjon 
(συντέλεια τοῦ αἰῶνος). This phrase, “the end of the 
world ”—in one passage, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, ἢ 
is connected with the Saviour’s death; but this is repre- 
sented as occurring in the “ last days” of the earlier Zon. 
Elsewhere, it occurs only in Matthew, and in all cases 
plainly refers to an event in the future, subsequent to the 
death and resurrection of the Lord.* It refers to the Ad- 
vent to Judgment. To this the question in Matthew re- 
lates:* ‘ What shall be the sign of thy Coming and of 
the End of the World --(συντέλεια τοῦ αἰῶνος) The 
temple, with the stately and splendid buildings connected 


1 See the remarks of Farrar, Life of Christ, pp. 258, 260. 
3 Heb. ix. 26. 5 Matt. xiii. 39, 40, 49, xxiv. 3, xxviii. 20. 
4 Matt. xxiv. 3. 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. HISTORIES. 371 


with it, were to be leveled to the earth. “Tell us,” they 
said, “‘ when shall these things be? And what shall be 
the sign of thy coming and of the end of the world?” 
The form of the questions indicates that the two events 
were thought of as simultaneous. The “great tribulation” 
(ver. 21) which was to attend the destruction of Jerusalem is 
described, and “immediately (εὐθέως) after the tribulation 
of those days” (ver. 29), the Son of Man is to come to judg- 
ment. All these things are to be accomplished before “ this 
generation shall have passed away ;” the term (γενεά) signi- 
fying what we mean by generation, there being three, accord- 
ing to Herodotus, in a century. It is explained elsewhere by 
equivalent phrases... In Luke and Mark, only the first of 
the questions is put by the Disciples; but the Advent to 
Judgment forms one theme of the discourse which fol- 
lows. In Mark there is mention of the unequaled tribula- 
tion (θλέψις) “in those days” (xiii. 19), when the temple 
shall be profaned; and it is added (ver. 24), “in those days,” 
“after that tribulation”—the word “immediately,” (ed- 
θέως) is wanting—the Son of Man will appear to Judg- 
ment; and “this generation shall not pass till all these 
things be done” (ver. 30). In Luke, the phraseology of 
the discourse varies considerably from the form in Matthew 
and Mark. The siege of Jerusalem is predicted in more 
definite terms: the city is to be compassed with armies.? 
Intervening between its capture and the Second Advent, 
Jerusalem is to be trampled under foot of the Gentiles, un- 
til “the times of the Gentiles”—the times appointed for 
the execution of the divine judgments upon the guilty city— 
shall have run out. But Luke goes on at once to the pre- 
diction of the Second Advent, and adds: “ This generation 
shall not pass away till all be fulfilled ” (ver. 32). 

To account for the juxtaposition, in the Synoptists, of 


1 Matt. xvi. 28, 2 Luke xxi. 20. 


312 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the two events, the destruction of the temple, and the 
Parusia, it is natural to suppose that Jesus may have con- 
templated both of these events in the same prophetic de- 
scription, without, however, affirming that they were to be 
contemporaneous in their actual occurrence.’ The ancient 
prophets predict the deliverance of the Jews from Babylon, 
and pass at once, as if no time were to intervene, to the great 
redemption to be accomplished by the Messiah, and to the 
prevalence of righteousness and peace on the earth. In 
the perspective of prophecy, the intervening space fades 
out of view. We are precluded from attributing this mode 
of vision to Jesus, both by our general conception of his 
clear insight, and by specific passages to which reference 
has been made. Nor is there any place in the New Tes- 
tament in which the agency of Christ in the destruction 
of Jerusalem is spoken of as an advent. Nevertheless, 


1 This is the view of some of the ablest exegetical scholars: “ It is 
easily explicable how it would happen that in the apprehension and 
repetition of such discourses, from the point of view of the hearers, ele- 
ments were blended together, which Christ—though exhibiting them in 
a certain correspondence to each other, and without assigning to them 
specific measures of time—nevertheless kept apart.” Neander, Leben 
Jesu, p. 659. 

“ Nous n’avons aucun scruple ἃ reconnditre que dans l’ardeur de leur 
attente du retour immédiat de Jésus, ils sont applique ἃ ce retour ce que 
rapportait uniquement 4 la ruine de Jérusalem. Toutes les explications 
destinées 4 attenuer cette difficulté ne parviennent qu’a la tourner sans 
la faire disparaitre.” De Pressensé, Jésus Christ, Son Temps, Sa vie, Son 
Oeuvre, p. 188. See, also, Godet’s Commentary on Luke, Eng. tr. ii. p. 260. 

Dr. Farrar says: “‘ The Evangelists have not clearly distinguished be- 
tween the passages in which He (Christ) is referring more prominently 
to one than the other ”—that is, to the fall of the Jewish polity and dis- 
pensation, and to the End of the World. “Their abbreviations of what 
Jesus uttered, and the sequence which they gave to the order of His ut- 
terances, were to a certain extent tinged by their own subjectivity—pos- 
sibly even by their own natural supposition—that the second horizon lay 
nearer to the first than it actually did in the designs of heaven.” Life of 
Christ, ii. 260. 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. HISTORIES. 373 


that He should speak, in the same discourse, of two great 
events, homogeneous in some striking points, the end of 
the Jewish dispensation, and the end of all things, the 
prediction of the last having a germinant and typical ful- 
fillment in the first, was natural." 

We find in the Synoptists, that He described the trium- 
phant spread of the Gospel as an Advent, and in imagery 
similar to that found in the eschatological discourse. To the 
High Priest, he said: “ Hereafter ”—or, to translate more 
correctly —“ from this time .onward, shall ye see the Son 
of Man sitting at the right hand of God, and coming in 
the clouds of heaven.” ? Here was to be a coming, a contin- 
uous coming, beginning from that moment. An analogous 
use of like imagery is seen in the assurance of Jesus to 
Nathanael: “ Hereafter”—from this time onward—“ ye 
shall see Heaven open, and the angels of God ascending 
and descending upon the Son of Man:”?® the reference 
being to the proofs of a living and constant intercourse 
with God on the part of Jesus, which the Disciple was 
to witness—for example, in the miracles. 

In John’s Gospel, there is no allusion to the destruction 
of the temple as an immediate precursor of the judgment. 
But the impartation of the Holy Ghost, and the great ef- 
fects to result from it, are designated as a Coming of 
Christ. If Jesus used this language as a description of 
other epochs in the development of the kingdom, language 


1 Baur thinks that Jesus did not predict the downfall of Jerusalem at 
all. He founds his opinion on Rey. xi. 2 5664.» where John appears not 
to expect the destruction of the city, or the temple. Ν. 7. Theolog., p. 
108. But itis not so clear that we have in this passage an Apostolic 
testimony of the import supposed, as to neutralize the authority of the 
Synoptists on this point.’ Besides, there is other evidence that Jesus 
foretold the downfall of the temple. See above, p. 342. See also 1 
Thess. ii, 14-17. 2 Matt. xxvi. 64. 3 John i. 51. 

4 John xiv 18 seq., xvi. 16, 20 seq.; ef. Eph. 11. 17. 


374 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


closely resembling that which denoted also the final Paru- 
sia, the expectation might arise that this final Coming was 
near at hand.’ It is not more remarkable that the Disci- 
ples were left to a misapprehension on this point than that 
they were left, for a time, in a like error as to the perpetual 
obligation of the Mosaic ceremonies. The Church, includ- 
ing the Apostles themselves, was to be enlightened grad- 
ually as to the real purport of the Master’s teaching, by 
the influence of the Spirit, and by the actual course of 
Divine Providence. Especially is it true of His prophetic 
utterances, which offered glimpses, for practical ends, and 
under symbolical forms, of the future of His kingdom, 
the full meaning of which time alone could unveil. 


Whatever difficulties or differences may exist on subor- 
dinate questions of interpretation, the proposition stands 
firm that the association of the destruction of Jerusalem 
and the last Judgment, in the manner and form in which 
they are connected in the First Gospel, could not exist, had 
this Gospel been written after the first of these events had 
taken place.” There would surely have been some explana- 
tion, some hint that an interval was to occur, in the room 
of the declarations which we actually find. The conclu- 
sion is inevitable that this Gospel was extant, in its present 
form, prior to A. D. 70, the date of the capture of the city 


* See Meyer, Evang. Matt., Anmerkk., p. 510 seq., and Bleek’s lucid 
and candid discussion, Synoptisch. Erkl. d. drei ersten Evangelien, p. 351 seq. 
In the Gospel of John, there are distinct references to the Coming of Christ 
at the Resurrection and Judgment (vi. 40, 54, v.28; xiv. 3). But this 
is not referred to as near (vi. 39 seq., 44, 54); while the Coming, 
through the Spirit, is described as near at hand (xiv. 15-18). It is 
worthy of note that in the writings of Paul, none of the references to 
the Second Advent is coupled with the destruction of Jerusalem as an 
immediate precursor. To this last event he may refer in 1 Thess. ii. 14-17. 

* ΤΡ εὐθέως du premier €évangile n’est plus possible aprés la ruine de 
Jérusalem.” Pressensé, Jésus Christ, sa Vie, ete., p. 201 n. 


WATER MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. HISTORIES. 375 


by Titus. Baur has attempted to refer the prediction to 
Hadrian, but in this he has had little support. He admits 
that the parallel passages must relate to the siege of Titus; 
that the statements in Luke admit of no other construc- 
tion.’ But Matthew is also explicit: it was the destruc- 
tion of the temple to which the question of the disciples 
was directed. We obtain then the result that the First 
Gospel was composed, in its present form, within the life- 
time of the disciples and companions of Christ. This con- 
clusion shuts out the mythical theory, and every other 
hypothesis that has been broached for the purpose of dis- 
crediting the miracles of Jesus. The main thing in the 
vindication of the New Testament history is to show that 
we have contemporary evidence, the best possible evidence 
for the establishment of historical facts. There are other 
proofs of the early date of the First Gospel, but there is 
none more adapted to impress conviction upon a critical 
student than the one just described. 

Thecharacter of the parallel statements in Mark, although, 
as we have said, they vary somewhat from those of Matthew, 
justifies the same conclusion respecting the date of the Se- 
cond Gospel. It must have preceded the destruction of 
Jerusalem by the forces of Titus. 

The phraseology of Luke is not such as to necessitate 
this conclusion with regard to the Third Gospel. The 
duration of “the times of the Gentiles” is not defined. 
Yet here it is possible to affirm with safety that it was 
written very near to the date when the Roman army under 
Titus captured the city. The generation that heard the 
teaching of Jesus had not passed off the stage. This fact 
concerning the Third Gospel fixes approximatively the date 
of the Book of Acts, which, beyond all question, was com- 
posed by the same author. It is utterly impossible to carry 


* Baur, N. T. Theologie, p. 316. 


376 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


forward the date of the composition of the Acts into the 
second century. Like the Third Gospel, it is the produc- 
tion of a contemporary of the Apostles. 

John, the last of the Evangelists, whose Gospel, accord- 
ing to the ecclesiastical tradition, was written later in the 
first century, does not introduce the eschatological discourse 
on which we have commented. Yet he refers, in one place, 
to the Second Advent, in such a manner as to afford some 
corroboration to the argument for the genuineness of the 
Fourth Gospel. Christ, after His Resurrection, foretells to 
Peter the martyrdom which that Apostle is to suffer; and 
in reply to Peter’s inquiry as to the lot that was to befall 
John, He made an answer which gave rise to the opinion 
that the Apostle was to survive until the second coming of 
his Master. But this inference, the Evangelist adds, was 
without warrant, as Jesus had simply put the question, by 
way of rebuke to Peter’s curiosity: “If I will that he 
tarry till I come, what is that to thee?” (John xxi. 18-24). 
It seems more natural to suppose that the record was made 
to remove an erroneous impression while John was still 
living. Had John died before, the fact would, probably, 
have been indicated. 

With respect to the first three Gospels, it must be re- 
membered that we have in them substantially one tradition— 
the Galilean tradition—of the doings and sayings of 
Christ. In the First Gospel, where the terms connecting 
the fall of Jerusalem and the second Advent are most 
precise, there are traces of a grouping of the Lord’s dis- 
courses, without the strict observance of chronology. When 
we compare Matthew and Luke, we find the Sermon on the 
Mount in both, but a portion of the matter which the first 
Evangelist places under this head, is elsewhere distributed 
by Luke.+ Thus the Lord’s Prayer is given by Luke, in 


1 That in Matthew other discourses are connected with the Sermon on 


~ 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. HISTORIES, 3t7 


connection with another occasion, when the Disciples re- 
quested Jesus to teach them how to pray, as John had taught 
his followers (Luke xi. 1-4). It is true that Christ may 
have twice given to His disciples the same form of suppli- 
cation, each Evangelist passing over in silence the occasion 
which the other records; but this hypothesis appears less 
probable. In Luke, there is no reference, either on the 
part of Christ, or of the Disciples, to the supposed fact that 
they had already received from him a form of prayer. In 
the thirteenth chapter of Matthew, there is a collection of 
parables pertaining to the kingdom of God, three of which 
—that of the pearl, the treasure, and the net—are wanting 
in the parallel passage in Mark. Mark, to be sure, refers 
to other parables uttered by Christ, but the reference is 
probably to parables uttered on other occasions. If, in set- 
ting down the eschatological teaching of Christ, the first 
Evangelist, likewise, has brought together sayings uttered 
on different occasions, there is a larger room for the influ- 
ence of personal expectations, in the arrangement of the 
matter and in the turn of phraseology. 

II. Wecall attention to the references in the New Testa- 
ment to the organization and polity of the Church. 

The Church was a society, and as such had an external 
coherence from the beginning. But its form of organization 
was a thing of gradual growth. It went through stages of 
development, not being prescribed in its details at the out- 
set, but taking on one feature after another, as the spread of 
the Christian community, and new emergencies, prompted. 
How far the changes of polity in post-apostolic times were 


the Mount, Calvin had the acuteness to perceive. He says: “ Sufficere 
enim piis et modestis lectoribus debet, quod hic ante oculos positam ha- 
beant summam doctrine Christi collectam ex pluribus et diversis con- 
cionibus quarum hee prima fuit, ubi de beatitudine disseruit apud discip- 
ulos.”” Opera (Amst. ed.) vi. 64. 


378 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


normal, justified by the principles of Christianity, is a 
question not pertinent here. As far as we speak of muta- 
tions of polity, we refer to them as facts generally conceded, 
and waive special controversies that are often connected 
with the subject. It is admitted on all hands that ecclesi- 
astical arrangements in the age of the Apostles were not 
precisely the same that they were in the age that followed, 
that the second century, in this particular, was not an ex- 
act copy of the first. 

There are two points in relation to the polity of the post- 
apostolic period, which we are here concerned to notice. 
The first is the precedence of a bishop over the presbyters, 
or elders, in each church. Whether this arrangement was 
effected by an Apostolic ordinance, as some maintain, or 
whether it arose naturally, from the force of circumstances, 
is a matter that we now leave untouched. This much is 
conceded at the present day by competent scholars, that the 
governing body, under the Apostles, in each church, in the 
Apostolic age, or, at least, until the latter section of that age, 
was made up of coequal presbyters. This is, also, conceded 
that when we pass to the post-apostolic writers, to the writers 
of the second century, we find traces of that changed orga- 
nization to which I have adverted. Polycarp is called 
bishop of Smyrna, by his pupil, Irenzeus, Polycarp having 
been a disciple of John, the Apostle; and Clement is styled 
the bishop of Rome; and Papias is commonly designated 
by the writers after him as the bishop of Hierapolis. It 
may be a fair subject of discussion what degree of prece- 
dence over the presbyters was allowed to these individuals, 
or claimed by them. Especially may it be doubted whether 
that precedence, whatever its nature was, existed universally, 
—whether it existed, for example, in the Church of Corinth, 
at the time when Clement of Rome wrote his Epistle, at Phi- 
lippi when Polycarp addressed the Church there, or even in 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. HISTORIES. 379 


the Church of Rome, to which one of the Ignatian Epistles 
is directed.' But all candid scholars must concede that the 
episcopal arrangement, in the form described, may be traced 
back to the verge of the Apostolic age, if not beyond, and 
that early in the second century it had become widely estab- 
lished. The shorter Greek Epistles of Ignatius are pro- 
bably genuine. If we accept these, or even the three Syriac 
Epistles of this Father--the three which are found in a Sy- 
riac version, and in the form in which they stand there—we 
must allow that the precedence of the bishop was an estab- 
lished feature in the polity of the churches of Antioch and 
Asia Minor, in the first decade of the second century. 
There is nothing to contradict this supposition. Irenzeus, 
who wrote in the last quarter of the century, knows of no 
different organization of the Church as having ever existed. 
He even erroneously speaks of the elders who bade adieu to 
Paul at Miletus as being the bishops of the churches about 
Ephesus.’ The bishop is called a presbyter by Irenzeus, but. 
the presbyter is not called a bishop. As far as he is con- 
cerned, vestiges of the original identity of the two terms and 
offices have mostly disappeared ; and Irenzeus, it should be 
observed, was a youth in the middle of the second century. 
The next point to be mentioned concerning the second 
century, is the prominence of questions relating to ec- 
clesiastical government. As the territory and members of 
the Church were enlarged, as persecutions became more 
formidable, and as heresies and divisions arose, more at- 
tention was directed to ecclesiastical unity and discipline. 
Whether tendencies of thought within the Church itself, 
that did not conduce to the interests of a pure Christianity, 
especially the rise of a sacerdotal theory of the ministry, 
may not have acted in the same direction, is an inquiry 


1 These points are considered in ch. xvii. of this work. 
2 Ady. Heer., III. xiv. 2. 


380 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


which we have no occasion here to pursue. Of the general 
fact of the increasing prominence of purely ecclesiastical 
arrangements, after we cross the boundaries of the second 
century, there is no dispute. 

Let us turn now to the New Testament, beginning with 
the Gospels. Here we find scarcely any references to the 
matter of church organization. The very word “church” 
(ἐχχλησία) occurs but twice, and, in both instances, in the 
Gospel of Matthew. The first passage is the declaration 
to Peter, in his character of a confessor of the faith in the 
Son of God: “On this rock will I build my church” 
(xvi. 18). The second is the direction to report the offence 
of a brother disciple to the “church,” in case he pays no 
heed to private admonition (xviii. 17). The term cor- 
responding to “church” (or éxxdyota) was familiar to 
readers of the Old Testament, as denoting the congregation 
of the people. Christ, in these passages, simply indicates 
that His followers are to be united in a community with mu- 
tual responsibilities,—a community which its enemies will 
not be able to destroy. Had the Gospels, or either of them, 
been produced in the second century, it is improbable that 
all foreshadowings of the later ecclesiasticism would have 
been excluded from them. The state of things which these 
authors found about them would haye been thrown back, 
in some of its distinctive features, into the earlier period, or 
would, at least, have left some traces upon the narrative. In 
the book of Acts, we have a record of events occurring in 
the Apostolic age. It is worthy of remark that the Author 
gives no account whatever of the first institution of the 
eldership, the first appointment of elders in the church. 
This office appears, in the course of the narrative, as an ex- 
isting feature of the polity of the church at Jerusalem, and 
of the church at Antioch ; but of its introduction the writer 
has nothing to say. A later writer, casting his eye back 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N.T. HISTORIES, 381 


upon the Apostolic age, would have been far less likely to 
pass over a fact of this nature. But this point is of less 
moment. What is the actual polity of the Church, as de- 
scribed by the Author of the Acts? It should be remem- 
bered that we have in mind now, not formal statements, 
but incidental allusions. We find then that Luke knows 
of no distinction between the sbishop and the elder. The 
terms are used indiscriminately. Apart from the superinten- 
dence of the Apostles, the eldership is the highest governing 
office. He describes the interview of Paul with the elders 
of the Ephesian church, at Miletus, and he styles them, or re- 
ports Paul as styling them, “bishops.”* ‘Take heed to 
yourselves, and to all the flock over which the Holy Ghost 
hath made you bishops” —“ overseers”’ it is rendered in our 
version. As before remarked, this is so far removed from 
the conceptions of Irenzeus, who was born as early as about 
A.D. 130, and from the Church constitution with which he 
had been familiar from childhood, that he imagines the elders 
at Miletus to have been bishops in the later, more restricted 
meaning of the title? The term “bishops” is used by 
Luke in an entirely unstudied way, and it is connected 
with no explanation, as it might have been, had he been 
writing at a time when the constitution of the Church had 
been, in this particular, modified. It is obvious that when 
he wrote, the organization of the Church had not reached 
the form which it began to assume at the close of the Apos- 
tolic age, and which had spread far and wide early in the 
second century. The episcopate of which Ignatius, as 
early as about 110 A. D., makes so much, and which Ire- 
nzeus and his contemporaries connect with the Apostles, did 
not yet exist. 

The identity of bishops and presbyters is recognized in 
the same way throughout the New Testament writings, 


1 Acts xx. 17 seq. 2 Adv. Her., III. xiv. 2. 


382 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


It is the “bishops and deacons” of the Church at Philippi, 
in connection with the other members, that Paul and Tim- 
othy address." There are two classes of officers, and the 
higher wear the episcopal title. In writing to Timothy, 
Paul states the qualifications of “bishops” and “ deacons,” 
with no mention of any intermediate office (1 Tim. iii. 1 seq. ; 
v. 8 seq.). Peter offers an exhortation to the elders of the 
churches of Asia Minor, that they should discharge faith- 
fully the episcopal duty (ἐπεσχοποῦντες) committed to them.’ 
There can be no doubt that these passages indicate the con- - 
stitution of the Church which was known to the New Tes- 
tament writers.’ 


Moreover, what is said of the functions of the different 
officers of the Church, shows the early period to which these 
writers belong. These functions did not remain exactly 
the same. New prerogatives and duties were gradually at- 
tached to the several offices. This is not so marked, for a 
considerable time, with reference to the office of deacon. 
Yet, early in the second century, an important dignity is 
ascribed to the deacons by Ignatius,* although they did 
not preach.> Originally they were almoners of the Church’s 
bounty. The narrative in the Acts informs us that their 
business was to “serve tables” (Acts vi. 2). They were te 
distribute alms to the poor and sick. They probably 
waited upon the table at the Feasts of Love, and at the 
Lord’s Supper which was commemorated in connection with 
them. But nowhere in the New Testament is there any 
intimation that a higher, or a different, official duty be- 
longed to them. If they preached, it was not in the charac- 


ΓΡΙΝΠ τ 1: 21 Peter v. 2. 

’ The Apocalypse is no exception, as the “angels” do not denote 
bishops. See Lightfoot, Philippians, 197 seq. 

4 Epistt. ad. Trall. 11., 111., ad. Magn. vi., ad. Smyrn. vii. 

5 See Bingham’s Antiquities, xiv. 4, ¢ 1. 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. HISTORIES. 383 


ter of deacons, or in virtue of holding this office. The office 
of presbyter did not remain unchanged. Like the corres- 
ponding office in the synagogue, it was originally a ruling 
function. At the outset, it does not appear that the elders 
were chosen with primary and express reference to teach- 
ing; much less that they were exclusively empowered to 
fulfill this work. Paul counts the elders who labor “ in 
word and doctrine,” that is, who teach, worthy of special 
esteem (1 Tim. v.17). This passage implies that the elders 
might not all engage in teaching. Yet, in the Epistle to 
the Ephesians, the same persons are designated “ pastors 
and teachers” (Eph. iv. 11); and Paul enumerates (1 Tim. 
iii. 2) among the qualities of a bishop that he should be 
“apt to teach.” We see, from these passages, how the 
teaching function came by degrees to be associated with 
the office of presbyter, as a necessary element. In the 
period when the Acts and the Epistles of Paul were written, 
the office is ripening into that form which it afterwards 
wore. No writer of the age immediately following that of 
the Apostles, would think of specifying the ability to teach 
as a desirable quality in a presbyter or bishop, as if the 
office might be bestowed on those not exercising or possess- 
ing this gift. 

On the whole, the ecclesiastical arrangements which are 
brought to light in the New Testament writings, and more 
particularly in the histories, belong to an earlier era, a 
lower stratum, than those which discover themselves in 
the writers of the second century. 

III. We have now to consider the heretical parties 
which sprang up in the early Church, and the bearing of 
these phenomena on the determination of the date of the 
New Testament books. 

The two formidable perversions of Christianity, against 
which the Church had to struggle, were the Ebionitic or 


384 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Judaizing, and the Gnostic. The former emanated from 
the Jewish side, and would have amalgamated Christianity 
with Judaism, converting the Church into a Jewish sect. 
The latter was the fruit of speculation, largely from 
heathen sources, and would have turned the Church into a 
philosophical school, and confounded the Gospel in a 
strange union with other religions, and with speculative 
systems alien to its nature. The great battle of the 
second century was with the Gnostics, whose various 
leaders, with their different schemes of doctrine, are fully 
delineated on the pages of Irenzus, and by his pupil 
Hippolytus. The precise date of the Ebionitic separa- 
tion, when the Judaizers formed themselves into distinct 
organizations at war with the Church, we cannot deter- 
mine with certainty. There is no doubt that the destruc- 
tion of the temple by Titus, and the events of the Jewish 
war, tended to precipitate this result. The drift of events 
was such as to force those who had clung to the Mosaic 
observances to a choice between the abandonment of them 
and a coalescence with the Gentile churches, or a movement 
in the direction of schism and isolation. Hegesippus, the 
old Jewish-Christian historian, who wrote not far from A. 
D. 150, makes the first outbreaking of heresy and division 
in the Jerusalem Church to have occurred on the death of 
Simeon, the successor of James, in A. Ὁ. 108.1 Whatever 
mistakes may stand in connection with this statement, there 
appears to be no reason for calling in question the chrono- 
logical datum. Justin, in his Dialogue with Trypho, which 
was written not long after the decree of Hadrian, forbidding 
Jewish worship in Jerusalem—that is, not long after A. D. 
135—was acquainted with both branches of the Judaizing 
faction, the Nazarenes, and the stricter Ebionites. ἢ 
1 Eusebius, H. E., iii. 32. 
? Dial. c. Trypho, 46, 48. See below, p. 498. 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. WRITINGS. 385 


Gnosticism, however obscure and varied in some of the 
forms which it assumed, was marked by certain distinct 
features. It was the offspring of a partly practical and 
partly speculative tendency, now the one element, and now 
the other, having the preponderance. The desire to pry into 
the mystery of creation and the mystery of evil, was one 
prevailing characteristic of this heresy. Evil was associated 
with matter. Hence matter was cut off from any relation 
to the Supreme God. This was one corollary; and as- 
eeticism which, by a natural oscillation, might pass into 
the opposite extreme of antinomian self-indulgence, was 
another consequence of the view taken of the material side 
of our being. Gnosticism boasted of a “ wisdom ”— 
y-wors—peculiar to its votaries; a higher insight into divine 
things. This was its first note. It would thus create an 
oligarchy of philosophers or devotees. In this particular, 
it stood upon a level with heathen philosophy generally, 
and in opposition to the Gospel. Secondly, the Gnostics 
agreed in attributing the world in which we live to an 
Angel, or a Demiurge, inferior to the infinite God. To 
bridge over the gulf between the ineffable One, who is 
elevated above all contact with matter, they laid hold of 
the notion of emanation, and postulated a series of beings 
standing in genetic connection with one another—forming 
a chain which proceeded from the supreme Deity, but the 
links of which, the farther they descended, were more 
and more separated from His pure essence. To one 
of these lower beings, the present order of things, to which 
we belong, was attributed. He was the God of the Jews, 
who was conceived of either as carrying out, though im- 
perfectly, in partial ignorance, the designs of the Supreme, 
or as in Satanic hostility to Him. The end and goal of 
all aspiration is deliverance from the bonds of matter and 


of the Demiurge. The Gnostic antipathy to matter, and 
25 


386 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the dualism involved in it, extended its influence to the 
conception of Christ’s person. ‘The human Jesus was sep- 
arated from the Heavenly Christ, so that in the room of a 
real incarnation, there was a temporary conjunction of the 
two. Docetism, in the form of a theory that He wore the 
mere semblance of a body, was the final outcome of this 
method of speculation. 

In Gnosticism of the less radical type—that type which 
made the Demiurge inferior, but not antagonistic, to the - 
Supreme God—several phases or gradations may be dis- 
tinguished. 

Cerinthus, the first noted leader in this heretical move- 
ment, was active in Asia Minor in the closing years of the 
first century. He came from Alexandria. He held 
that below the Supreme Deity is a series of angels, one 
of whom, who was ignorant of the Most High God, was 
the Creator of the world by whom the Mosaic Law was 
given to the Jews.’ Jesus he held to be the son of Joseph 
and Mary. With him, at his baptism, the heavenly 
Christ united Himself, but continued with him only up 
to the time when His sufferings commenced. With these 
Gnostic characteristics were blended Judaic peculiarities. 
His conception of Christ was Ebionitic. He is supposed 
to have included in his system the practice of circumcision 
and the observance of the Sabbath. And his sensuous Chili- 
asm, or theory of an earthly Millennium,’ was thoroughly 
Judaic in its character, and utterly diverse from the later 
forms of Gnosticism. The Gnosticism of Cerinthus was 


1 Et Cerinthus autem quidam in Asia non a primo Deo factum esse 
mundum docuit, sed a virtute quadam valde separata et distante ab ea 
principalitate, que est super universa, et ignorante eum, qui est super 
omnia, Deum. Iren., Adv. Her., I. xxvi. 1: cf. Hippolyt., Ref. omn. 
Her., vii. 21, x. 17, Tertullian, de Prescript., iii. 

Caius, ap. Euseb. H. £. iii. 28, Dionys. Alexandr. ap. Euseb. H. Τὶ 


iii. 28. 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. WRITINGS. 387 


thus, in some of its main points, Judaic. It had certain 
features strongly akin to the characteristics of the sect of 
Essenes. Whether adherents of this sect had made their 
way into Asia Minor, or whether the phenomena which we 
have in mind, sprang up independently, from a kindred 
tendency, it is clear that a sort of Gnosticism which may 
be termed Essenian, appeared there in the latter part of the 
first century. 

If now we go forward into the second century, we find 
in the systems of Basilides, who taught at Alexandria about 
A. D., 125, and of Valentinus, who came from Alexandria 
to Rome about A. D. 140, an obvious and decided advance 
upon the comparatively simple scheme of Cerinthus. The 
demiurge is still the instrument, and not the opponent, of the 
Supreme, and the two dispensations are not yet represented 
as absolutely antagonistic to one another. But the pecu- 
liar Ebionitic and Judaic features of the doctrine of Cerin- 
thus are dropped. A vast and complicated system of 
super-terrestrial beings, of whom the demiurge is one, are 
called into existence. 

The question arises whether there are not traces of Gnos- 
tic phenomena, which precede Cerinthus,—that is to say, 
which are less developed and coherent than the dogmas of 
this heresiarch. Now such phenomena, gnostic opinions in 
the germ, do actually appear in certain books of the New 
Testament. We leave out of consideration here the Pas- 
toral Epistles, where the incipient heresy is plainly deline- 
ated and condemned. We confine our attention to the 
Epistles to the Colossians and to the Ephesians. Espe- 
cially in the former of these Epistles we find that the 
Apostle Paul censures a class of errorists who are not sepa- 
rated from the Church, but who cherish and inculcate no- 
tions evidently Gnostical in their character.! They pre- 


1 Compare, Prof. Lightfoot, Colossians, p. 98 seq. It is true that the 


388 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


tended to a “wisdom” above that of the generality of 
disciples.’ There was an angelology, and a worship of 
angels, on which the Apostle animadverts with severity. 
And there grew out of the dualistic theory of these persons 
an asceticism which Paul likewise condemns, and which is 
by no means limited to the austerities for which a warrant 
might be sought in the Mosaic law. In the book of Reve- 
lation, which was written not far from the date of the 
Epistle to the Colossians, and in the region to which this 
Epistle was sent, the same false speculation is noticed as the 
source of an antinomian license. ? 

We may distinguish, then, these three stages in the Gnos- 
tic development, the germinant Gnosticism combated in the 
Epistle to the Colossians, the system of Cerinthus, and the 
subsequent systems of Basilides, Valentinus, and their fol- 
lowers. 

What light do the successive phases of Gnosticism throw 
upon the date of the New Testament histories? The first 
three Gospels and the Acts are silent upon this heresy. 
But according to the ecclesiastical tradition, which on this 
point there is no sufficient reason to distrust, the Apostle 
John personally knew and personally opposed Cerinthus.? 

When we open the Fourth Gospel, and the First Epistle 
of John, we see that doctrines directly hostile to those at- 
tributed to Cerinthus are emphatically asserted. The re- 
ality of the incarnation is affirmed, and those who deny 


genuineness of the Epp. to the Colossians and the Ephesians has been 
questioned by various German critics, but on quite insufficient grounds, 
See Reuss, Gesch. d. heiligen Schriften d. N. T., 1. 107 seq., where the 
proofs of the Pauline authorship are convincingly stated. 

1 See the references in Lightfoot, Ibid., p. 100. 

2 Rey. ii. 14, 20-22. Cf. 2 Peter, ii. 10 seq.; Jude 8. 

3 Trenzeus, III. iii. 4. The anecdote of the Apostle meeting Cerinthus 
in a bath, was derived from Polycarp, though not directly communicated 
to Irenzus himself: “ Et sunt qui audierunt eum dicentem,” ete, 


WATER-MARKS OF AGE IN THE N. T. WRITINGS. 389 


that Christ has come in the flesh are denounced as having 
the spirit of Antichrist. The statement of the Fathers 
that John had in mind the errors of Cerinthus is corrobo- 
rated by the contents of these writings. Moreover, the 
conception of Christ which the Johannine writings present, 
is the same as that which Paul held up in the Epistle to the 
Colossians, as an antidote to the notion of angelic mediators 
with which the Gnostics peopled the “ pleroma.’”” The the- 
ology of the Fourth Gospel, and of the Ist Epistle of John, 
in its bearing on the Gnostic errors, is just what we should 
expect, if these writings were composed, as the Church tra- 
dition affirms, between the date of the Epistle to the Colos-~ 
sians and the close of the first century. On the contrary, 
the internal features of the Basilidian and Valentinian 
schools, belong to a later epoch; and they are such, more- 
over, aS presuppose an acquaintance on the part of their 
authors with the Johannine writings. They borrow the 
ideas and phraseology of John, and interweave them, in a 
distorted form, into their complex and fantastic creations.' 


1 So judges such a critic as Lipsius. See his article Gnosis, in Schen- 
kel’s Bibel-Lexicon, p. 504. 


390 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER XII. 


THE CRITICAL TREATMENT OF THE NEW TESTAMENT 
HISTORIES. 


THE Scriptures have never failed to manifest their unique 
and transcendent power wherever there are minds at all ~ 
susceptible to the influence of moral and religious truth. 
There is no higher evidence of Inspiration than this ability 
‘‘to find us,” as Coleridge has expressed it, in the deepest 
wants, the secret sins, and the profound aspirations of the 
soul. But while this effect of the Bible is general, the tho- 
rough and critical study of the Book has been confined to 
certain times, and to comparatively few individuals. There 
were scholars in the ancient Church. Origen, Jerome, Chry- 
sostom, Theodore, Theodoret, and other names that might 
properly be associated with these, stand high on the roll 
of Biblical students. But through the long period of the 
middle ages, criticism was dormant. The scholastic theo- 
logians were too ignorant of the languages and of history 
to accomplish any thing of importance in this province of 
study. With the revival of learning, the Scriptures be- 
gan once more to be examined in a scholarly spirit. The 
Reformation was largely due to this study, which the Re- 
naissance had awakened. Men like Reuchlin and Erasmus 
paved the way for Luther, Melanchthon, and Calvin. But 
at the Reformation, the Bible was acknowledged alike by 
both the great parties, the Protestant and the Roman Ca- 
tholic. The conflict between them turned on the question 
whether the medizval system of doctrine was, or was not, 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 391 


sanctioned in the Scriptures, and the further question whe- 
ther the interpretations decreed by the Church were bind- 
ing on the individual. But when the authority of tradition 
was cast away, and the right of the Church and of the Pope 
to dictate the interpretation of the Sacred Books was de- 
nied, the effect must be to concentrate attention upon the 
Bible, and to cause it to be studied by Protestants with 
an absorbing earnestness. Religious feeling, with the in- 
tellectual awakening that attended it, could not fail to 
turn inquiry in this direction. Yet the contests of the six- 
teenth and seventeenth centuries were mainly doctrinal. 
For dispassionate, scholarly research upon matters not 
directly involved in the great controversy, there was not so 
much call, nor was the temper of the times favorable for 
work of this kind. The various religious parties were soon 
busy in formulating their tenets, and in embodying them 
in creeds. The scholarship of the Renaissance in Italy 
was largely rationalistic in its spirit; but this betrayed 
itself principally in the attitude assumed towards the doc- 
trinal and ethical teaching of the Church. Luther, 
although his whole tone, his whole philosophy of religion, 
was antagonistic to what is properly called Rationalism, 
expressed himself with characteristic freedom upon ques- 
tions relating to the canon, and to the relative merit of the 
books that enter into it. And these opinions, he did not 
hesitate, with a frankness equally characteristic, to intro- 
duce into the prefaces of his translation of the Bible. But 
remarks of this nature had no perceptible effect on the 
systems of Protestant theology in the period that ensued. 
The Bible having been made the Rule of Faith, nothing 
was tolerated that was supposed to imply any sort of 
blemish in it, or any possible doubt as to what books really 
belong to it. Calvin, notwithstanding his dogmatic rigor, 
had much of the genuine spirit of a scholar, and not seldom 


392 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


shows in his commentaries a manly freedom from bondage 
to the letter. But to the distinguished Arminian scholars, 
Grotius, Le Clere, and their associates, belongs the credit of 
being pioneers in directing the mingled lights of philo- 
logy and history, in a scientific spirit, upon the Scriptures, 
and upon the literature of the early Church. Since the 
beginning of the eighteenth century, or from the time of 
Leibnitz, the relation of science—taking the term in the 
broadest sense, as the synonym of knowledge accurately 
ascertained by natural means—to the Bible, and to 
Revealed Religion, has been, whether consciously, or 
not, the one principal theme of philosophical and the- 
ological discussion. One branch of this comprehensive 
inquiry is Criticism—the investigation of the origin, au- 
thorship, and meaning of the several books of the Bible, 
and of the credibility of the history which it contains. 
Germany is the country where, for a century past, these 
studies have flourished most. That they are legitimate 
and necessary, no Protestant can deny. Surely the limits 
of the canon, and the meaning and credibility of Scripture, 
must be determined by authority, or by investigation. Re- 
jecting the infallibility of tradition, we have no alterna- 
tive but to determine these questions by historical and 
philological science. Nor can it be denied that rich contri- 
butions to knowledge, in this department, have been made, 
by the scholars of Germany, and in other countries where 
of late the same spirit of investigation has arisen. If there 
have been rash hypotheses without number, uncertified 
conjectures presumptuously put forward as_ established 
truth, speculations of a Pantheistic or Atheistic Rational- 
ism arrogating the name of science, and bending history 
and scripture to conform to its theoretic bias, there have 
been, also, on the other hand, an exhaustive research, a 
patient investigation of every monument of the past that 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 393 


could throw a ray of light upon the Scriptures, and upon 
the origin of Christianity, and not unfrequently a just and 
discriminating judgment, which have yielded the most 
valuable fruits. Honor to the scholars who have spent 
their lives in the unwearied effort to elucidate the docu- 
ments of the Christian religion ! 

As regards the credibility of the Gospel history, it ought 
to be clearly understood that the modern attack by Baur, 
Strauss, Zeller and others, is founded upon an @ priori as- 
sumption. It is taken for granted beforehand that what- 
ever is supernatural is unhistorical. The testimony into 
which a miracle enters is stamped at once as incredible. 
Christianity, it was assumed, was an evolution of thought 
upon the natural plane. Ata later day, Strauss fell into 
a materialistic way of thinking, which rendered him, if 
possible, more deaf to all the evidence which, if admitted, 
implies the supernatural. From the point of view taken 
by the skeptical school, therefore, the New Testament his- 
tories, so far as they relate to the wonderful works of 
Christ, and His Resurrection, and Manifestation to His Dis- 
ciples after His death, must be discredited. But their prin- 
ciple, or prejudice, carries the negative critics farther. It 
must affect their judgment as to the authorship of the 
narratives which record the miracles. It is rendered diffi- 
cult to believe, if not quite improbable, that these histories 
emanate from Apostles, eye-witnesses of the life of Jesus. 
The myths, or the consciously invented stories, the pro- 
duct of a theological “tendency” in the primitive Church, 
cannot well be ascribed to the immediate followers of 
Christ. The fact that the New Testament histories con- 
tain accounts of miracles, also tends to weaken and vitiate 
their general authority, in the estimation of the skeptical 
school. That is to say, the credulity of the Gospel writers, 
or their willingness to deceive, as evinced in the supernat- 


394 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


ural elements embraced in their books, makes them less 
entitled to trust in their record of ordinary events into 
which the miracle does not enter. Such are the conse- 
quences, the logical and actual consequences, of the prepos- 
session with which the critics to whom we refer approach 
the New Testament writings. How different the posture 
of those who put no such ban upon the supernatural, but 
whose minds are open to recognize a divine and miracu- 
lous element in the origination of Christianity! This 
diversity is well set forth in a passage of Neander, in which 
he is speaking of the conversion of Paul on the road to 
Damascus: ‘‘ A transaction like this, from its very nature, 
will never admit of being proved in a way that is wniver- 
sally convincing. In order to be recognized in its reality, 
it is requisite that it should be looked upon from a certain 
point of view. Whoever is a stranger to this, must of 
necessity struggle against admitting the fact. In truth, for 
history in general there is no such thing as mathematical 
demonstration: faith, trust, is always called into requisi- 
tion in the recognition of historical truth. The only ques- 
tion is, whether there is adequate ground for it, or more 
that challenges doubt. The decision depends upon the 
understanding of the facts, and of the whole province to 
which they belong. The provocation to doubt is the 
stronger in proportion as the nature of the transactions in 
question, and of the peculiar province to which they per- 
tain, is foreign to the spirit of the observer, and the less 
these transactions are capable of being judged by the stan- 
dard to which he is accustomed, and from the circle of 
experience familiar to him. Still more is the remark ap- 
plicable to transactions which follow another law than that 
of the common course of nature, and in which a supernat- 
ural element is involved. Whoever thinks that everything 
must be explained by natural laws, being resolved to recog- 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 395 


nize nothing supernatural, and is forced to take this ground 
by his whole philosophical system, will feel himself com- 
pelled to refer, also, the history of Paul’s conversion to 
those common laws of nature, and to deny away everything 
that opposes them. It would be in vain to dispute with 
him about special points where the underlying principle of 
his whole theory has predetermined the course of his in- 
quiry and its results.”" 

Connected with the unscientific assumption first noticed, 
other assumptions were adopted by the Tiibingen school 
which are equally unsound. It was assumed that Christ- 
ianity is an evolution of thought according to the scheme 
of the Hegelian logic, where it is held as a law that a 
doctrine in an undeveloped form must divaricate into two 
opposites, to be recombined afterwards in a higher unity. 
Thus it was assumed that Paulinism, and the sharply de- 
fined Judaizing system attributed to Peter, were the an- 
tagonistic types of opinion which sprang out of the seed of 
doctrine planted by Christ, and which were reunited in the 
old Catholic Theology, the evangelical legalism of the 
Fathers of the second century. The primitive form of Chris- 
tianity, the teaching of Christ Himself, was hardly to be 
distinguished from Ebionitism, and was described by the 
Tiibingen critics in such a way as to stand in no _percepti- 
ble genetic relation to the system of Paul. This contracted 
idea of the scope and spirit of the teaching of Jesus, which 
finds no real link of connection between the Founder of 
Christianity and the Apostle Paul, is a prolific source of 
errors in the Tiibingen school. The Tiibingen theory can 
be supported only by making the Gospels the creations of 
a doctrinal or speculative tendency, conceived of as shaping 
and coloring facts to suit its own ends. When brought to 
the test, this theory of the Gospels breaks down signally. 


1 Pflanz. u. Leit. d. Kirche, i. 154, 


396 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


The First Gospel, the Judeo-Christian Gospel, as it is 
pronounced, contains a variety of passages in which the 
catholic features of Christianity are set forth most impres- 
sively, sometimes in striking agreement with the funda- 
mental ideas of Paul.' The homage paid by the heathen 
Magi to Christ is one of the first incidents which it 
records (ii. 1-11). The supplanting of the Jews by the 
heathen is even implied in a declaration quoted from 
John the Baptist (111. 9). Mark, to which the Tiubin- 
gen critics ascribed a late date, and a neutrality between 
the opposing tendencies which is the result of an avoid- 
ance of extremes already developed, is not only wrongly 
placed by them chronologically, but does not sustain 
this character of purposed neutrality which is attributed 
to it. Nor does the Gospel of Luke submit to the 
Procrustean bed which is framed for it. It contains 
passages not a few, which a theological partisan of the cha- 
racter with which the Author is credited could never have 
introduced. The contents of each of these Gospels forbid 
the assumption of a doctrinal purpose operating in the 
manner claimed, and vindicate their character as honest 
histories. This is not the conclusion of any extreme school 
of opinion; it is the deliberate judgment of critics like 
Holtzmann, Reuss, and Mangold, who on many questions 
of criticism and of theology are at a wide variance from 
traditional opinions. “Our Matthew, is to be sure, written 
by a Jewish Christian for Jewish Christians ;’ “but he 
has given us no Jewish Christian doctrinal product (ten- 
denz-schrift).”? “The words of Jesus, quoted in Mat- 
thew, which form the doctrinal] kernel of the book, are not 


1Matt. xxiv. 14, xxviii. 19, viii. 12, xx. 1seq., xxi. 28, 33; xxii. 40, 
ΧΧΊΙ. 33; ix. 16 seq., xii. 8, xiii. 31. Cf. Essays on the Supernat. Origin 
of Christianity, p- 213-215, and Reuss, Gesch. d. heilig. Schrift., p. 195. 

? Mangold in Bleek’s Hinl., pp. 342, 343. 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 397 


selected in the slightest degree from that point of view ”— 
that of the Palestinian Jewish Christianity—“ but go 
beyond it in a hundred places, and bespeak so much the 
more the faithfulness of the tradition.”' Mark has de- 
cidedly outgrown Judaism, “but no dogmatic tendency 
can on this account be saddled upon his Representation 
of the Gospel history, as long as it is not shown that 
Christ Himself did not rise above Judaism, and that 
the Jewish Christian Matthew looks upon Christianity 
as a development within the limits of Judaism.” In 
Luke “not only does the history of Jesus get in gen- 
eral no other significance than in Matthew ; nowhere does 
the design betray itself to set aside or to overcome an 
imperfect religious understanding of it. On the contrary, 
there occur numerous words and acts, drawn from the gen- 
eral tradition, which, when literally taken, rather bear on 
them a Jewish Christian tone. But here it will be nearest 
the truth to affirm that not a party feeling, but the most 
independent historical research, or, if one prefer it, a thirst 
for the fullest possible information, has collected together 
the matter.”* As far as the first three Gospels are con- 
cerned, the impeachment of their historical credibility by 
the imputation of a theological bias, or a partisan doctri- 
nal end, to their authors, has been utterly overthrown on 
the field of criticism. The book of Acts is of a piece in 
this respect with the Third Gospel. It remains to be seen 
whether there will not eventually be as great a degree of 
concurrence in favor of the historical credibility of the 
Fourth Gospel, and against the hypothesis of a theological 
“tendency” creating or warping facts for its support. 

The school of which Strauss is the most famous repre- 
sentative, have carried on their war against the Evangel- 


* Reuss, p. 194. * Mangold, p. 342; cf. Holtzmann, p. 384 seq. 
3 Reuss, p. 212. 


398 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


ists by sophistical means. The aim has been to convict 
the Gospels of inconsistency and contradiction to such an 
extent as to make them untrustworthy, and to render the 
life of Jesus, beyond the most general outlines, utterly 
obscure and uncertain. One of the Evangelists is used to 
disprove the statement of another ; and the second, in turn, 
is impeached on the authority of the first. The first Life 
of Christ by Strauss, his principal work, is full of exam- 
ples of this circular reasoning. But, besides this transpa- 
rent vice of logic, in the treatment of the details of the 
history, there is a flagitious disregard of the sound and 
acknowledged principles of historical criticism. Variations, 
however innocent, are magnified into an irreconcilable discor- 
dance. Peculiarities in the narratives, such as occur in 
the most authentic historical writers, are imputed by Baur 
and his followers to contrivance. All who pursue histori- 
cal studies, all who take notice of testimony in courts, or 
even of ordinary conversation, know how many occasions 
there are for varying the form of a narrative, besides a 
want of knowledge, or of honesty in the narrator. The 
desire of brevity leads to the modification of the features 
of a transaction in the report of it. To give prominence to 
one element, or aspect, of the story, the order of circum- 
stances may be changed. For the sake of making an event 
intelligible to a particular person, or class, or to give 
graphic force to the account of it, something may have to 
be added or subtracted. Thus a diversity of form may be 
produced, which yet involves no error. An unknown cir- 
cumstance may be the missing link which unites testi- 
mony that is apparently discordant. The justice of these 
remarks, and the fallacy of the Straussian method of criti- 
cism, are best illustrated by examples drawn from ordinary 
history. As one instance, we may refer to two passages, 
in the last volume of the elder President Adams’s Letters, 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 


399 


which were written with an interval of little more than a 


year between them: 


(A.) To William Tudor, 
Quincy, 5 June, 1817. 

Mr. Otis, soon after my earliest 
acquaintance with him, lent me a 
summary of Greek Prosody, of his 
own collection and composition, a 
work of profound learning and great 
labor. I had it six months in my 
possession before I returned it. 
Since my return from Europe, I 
asked his daughter whether she 
had found that work among her 
father’s manuscripts. She answered 
with a countenance of woe that you 
may more easily imagine than I can 
describe, that ‘‘she had not a line 
from her father’s pen; that he had 
spent much time, and taken great 
pains to collect together all his let- 
ters and other papers, and in one 
of his unhappy moments, commit- 
ted them all to the flames.” Ihave 
used her own expressions. 


(B.) To H. Niles, 
Quincy, 14 June, 1818, 


After my return from Europe, I 
asked his daughter whether she had 
found among her father’s manu- 
scripts a treatise on Greek Prosody. 
With hands and eyes uplifted, in a 
paroxysm of grief, she cried, ‘Oh! 
sir, I have not a line from my fa- 
ther’s pen. I have not even his 
name in his own handwriting.” 
When she was a little calmed, I 
asked her, “Who has his papers? 
where are they?” She answered, 
“They are no more. In one of 
those unhappy dispositions of mind 
which distressed him after his great 
misfortune, and a little before his 
death, he collected all his papers 
and pamphlets, and committed 
them to the flames. He was seve- 
ral days employed in it.” 


Suppose that these two narratives, instead of being from 
the pen of a modern writer, had been found by a critic of 
the Straussian type in the Gospels, the first of them being 
in one Evangelist, and the second in another. What a 
field for suspicion! What confident hypotheses should we 
have for the explanation of the phenomena in question! We 
should be told that document B isa product of exaggeration, 
founded on the simple story in A. The “ countenance of 
woe,” in A, is turned into “ eyes uplifted,” and a “ parox- 
ysm of grief,” in B. The reply of the daughter is broken 
up into separate parts for “dramatic effect.” The circum- 
stance that “‘pamphlets”’ as well as “letters” and “papers’”’ 


400 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


are mentioned among the things destroyed, is an addition 
from the fancy of the second writer. The general view 
as to the relation of the two documeuts is confirmed be- 
yond a question by the fact that the destruction of the 
papers is said in A to have been accomplished in “one of 
his unhappy moments,” while B makes it the work of 
“several days.” A, makes the collection of these ma- 
terials for the flames occupy a prolonged period ; B thinks 
that the impression would be more startling to represent 
the conflagration itself as long in duration. But why does 
B. omit the statement that the book of Prosody had been 
“six months” in the hands of the writer at a previous 
time? Obviously, because the disappointment at its de- 
struction would be softened by the circumstance that Mr. 
Adams had already perused the work; and this would 
clash with the intention of the writer of B., who will paint 
the calamity in the liveliest colors. We appeal to any one 
who is conversant with modern critical works upon the 
Gospels, if this representation is not a fair parody of the 
procedure of the skeptical school in their handling of 
them. As it happens, in the present case, we know that 
both documents are from one hand, the hand of a writer 
of scrupulous veracity. The same fact is narrated in the 
one briefly, in the other more in detail. Both, considering 
the compass of each, and the end for which they were 
written, are accurate. When, in the first letter, Mr. 
Adams says that he has “used her own expressions,” he 
does not mean to be understood as giving everything that 
she said, or the precise order in which her answers were 
spoken. 

Let the reader take up any important event in ancient 
or modern history, which has been described by several 
writers, even in cases when they were eye-witnesses, and 
not unobservant or dishonest, and he will find variations 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 


401 


in matters of detail, which, to a great extent at least, might 
disappear, were the whole transaction presented to our 
view, and which, in any event, do not affect the substance 


of the narrative. 


The death of Cicero is described by Plutarch and Ap- 
pian, and is noticed also by Dion Cassius, Livy, and 


others. 
accounts :— 


Plutarch, Vita Ciceronis. 

But in the meantime the assassins 
were come with a band of soldiers, 
Herennius acenturion, and Popilius 
[ Leenas] a tribune whom Cicero had 
formerly defended when prosecuted 
for the murder of his father. Find- 
ing the doors shut, they broke them 
open, and Cicero not appearing, and 
those within saying they knew not 
where he was, it is stated that a 
youth, who had been educated by 
Cicero in the liberal arts and sci- 
ences, an emancipated slave of his 
brother Quintus, Philologus by 
name, informed the tribune that 
the litter was on its way to the sea 
through the close and shady walks. 
The tribune, taking a few with him, 
ran to the place where he was to 
come out. And Cicero, perceiving 
Herennius running in the walks, 
commanded his servants to set down 
the litter ; and stroking his chin, as 
he used to do, with his left hand, he 
looked steadfastly upon his mur- 
derers, his person covered with dust, 
his beard and hair untrimmed, and 
his face worn with troubles. So that 
the greatest part of those that stood 
by covered their faces whilst He- 
rennius slew him. And thus was 


26 


We set in parallel columns the two principal 


Appian, de Bellis Civ. IV. xix. xx. 


While now many people ran 
about here and there, inquiring if 
Cicero had been seen anywhere, and 
some, out of good-will and compas- 
sion for him, said: “ He has already 
sailed and is out upon the sea,” a 
shoemaker, a client of Clodius, the 
most bitterenemy of Cicero, pointed 
out the right way to Lenas, the cen- 
turion, who had a few soldiers with 
him. lLenas hurried after, and, at 
the sight of the servants, whom he 
saw to be of a greater number than 
his following, and prepared for re- 
sistance, made use of a soldier’s 
stratagem, and called out: Centu- 
rions who are behind, hasten for- 
ward! By this means the servants, 
under the idea that more were 
coming, were struck with a panic 
(καταπλάγησαν). And Lenas, al- 
though he had once gained a cause 
by the aid of Cicero, dragging his 
head out of the litter severed it from 
the body, or rather, from want of 
skill, sawed it off, since he struck 
the neck three times. At the same 
time he cut off the hand with which 
Cicero had written those speeches 
against Antony asatyrant, to which, 
after the example of Demosthenes, 


402 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


he murdered, stretching forth his | he gave the name of Philippics. 
neck out of the litter, being now in 

his sixty-fourth year. Herennius 

cut off his head, and, by Antony’s 

command, his hands also, by which 

the Philippics were written; for so 

Cicero styled those orations he wrote 

against Antony, and so they are 

called to this day. 


It will be observed that Plutarch states that it was a 
freedman of Quintus, named Philologus, who told the pur- 
suers of Cicero what path he had taken. Appian, on the 
other hand, says that it was a shoemaker, a client of Clau- 
dius. Plutarch (with whom Livy agrees) says that Cicero 
stretched his head out of the litter; Appian says that 
Lenas pulled it out. Plutarch says that Herennius 
cut off the head; Appian that it was done by Leenas, 
awkwardly, in three blows—by sawing rather than cut- 
ting. Plutarch says that his hands were cut off, and 
Livy that the head was fastened to the rostrum between 
the two hands. Appian’s statement is, that the hand was 
eut off which had written the Philippics,—that is, the right 
hand. Appian states that the servants of Cicero were dis- 
mayed by the shout of Lenas, which implied the presence 
of astrong force near. But Plutarch informs us that 
Cicero directed the litter to be set down; and Livy adds to 
this that he commanded the bearers of it to make no resist- 
ance.' Dio states not only that it was Leenas who cut 
off the head, but that he kept the skull near to a gar- 
landed image of himself, in order that he might have the 
credit of the deed.” 

That memorable scene in English history when Oliver 

1°“ Satis constat . .. . - ipsum deponi lecticam et quietos pati quod 
fors iniqua cogeret jussisse.” Fragment. ad. lib. exx., ap. Seneca, Sua- 
soria, vil. 

2 Hist., xlvii. 10. 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 403 


Cromwell dispersed the Long Parliament, and locked the 
door, has been described by Whitelocke, Algernon Sidney, 
and Ludlow, the two former of whom were present, and 
the last, who was in Ireland, derived his information from 
eye-witnesses. There are various points of difference in 
these three narrations. For instance, Whitelocke says that 
Cromwell led a file of musketeers in with him, leaving the 
rest at the door and in the lobby. Ludlow says nothing 
of the introduction of the soldiers into the room where the 
house was sitting, until they were summoned in by Crom- 
well’s order. Whitelocke says that Col. Harrison rose and 
took the speaker by the arm ; Ludlow that he put his hand 
within the speaker’s hand, and in this way assisted him out 
of the chair. These and other differences are enough to 
furnish a hostile critic with the means for a plausible attack 
upon the credibility, if not of the main event, of the lead- 
ing circumstances attending the event. Yet, whoever will 
recur to Mr. Carlyle’s or Mr. John Forster’s description, 
will see that we are driven to no such unsatisfactory con- 
clusion. 

Nothing can be more unwarrantable and fallacious than 
to raise doubts respecting a whole transaction on account 
of real or seeming discrepancies that relate to a single fea- 
ture of it. It is a controverted question who commanded 
the American forces at Bunker Hill. Some have said that 
it was Prescott, others have said that it was Putnam. 
Whatever the truth may be, whether it was the one, or 
the other, or neither, or both, this discrepancy in contem- 
porary or later accounts, proves nothing against the reality 
of that occurrence which we call the Battle of Bunker’s 
Hill. The preliminaries and main events of that engage- 
ment have been correctly reported. The difference in the 
writers as to who was the commander, may, perhaps, be 
adjusted, without the ascription of an actual error to any 


404 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


of the authorities on which we depend for our knowledge 
of the event. Yet diversities of no more significance have 
often been made a pretext for impeaching the trustworthi- 
ness of the Gospel historians, and denying the reality of 
the various transactions which they record. 

There is thus a proper sphere for the Harmonist. A 
consecutive narrative, and one as complete as the materials 
at our command render it possible to construct, of the life 
of Jesus, must be founded on a comparison of the four 
Gospels; just as a history of the Apostolic Age must rest 
upon the foundation of the book of Acts, and the Epistles 
studied in connection with it. The prejudice against the 
Harmonists as a class, which prevails widely even among 
scholars who have no disposition to reject the supernatural 
elements of the evangelical history, has its origin in extra- 
vagances of harmonistic writers. An extravagant con- 
ception of the nature and extent of inspiration as related 
to the historical writings of the New Testament has charac- 
terized this school. The inspiration of the Evangelists, in- 
stead of having its effect in an elevation of mind, and in spi- 
ritual insight, has been thought to secure an impeccability 
of memory,—to operate, like the demon of Socrates, in a 
negative way, and by holding them back from the slightest 
inaccuracy, to furnish a guaranty for the absolute correct- 
ness of all the minutiz of the narrative. This perfection 
of memory and judgment—which Dr. Arnold says would 
imply the transference of divine attributes to men—has 
been considered an attribute of the Apostolic office. As 
three out of the five histories in the New Testament were 
not written by Apostles, it has been assumed that the rela- 
tion of Mark to Peter, and of Luke to Paul, gives an 
Apostolic authority to these non-apostolic Evangelists. 
That the second and third Gospels, and the Acts, were ever 
submitted to Apostles for their revision and sanction, is a 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 405 


proposition which no enlightened scholar would venture to 
affirm. We find that Luke, in the prologue of the Gos- 
pel, does not assume to write, as Councils of the Church 
have sometimes done, Sancto Spiritu dictante; but he in- 
vites confidence on the ground of his means of getting 
knowledge, and his diligent investigations. Some of the 
evangelical historians, Luke certainly, make use of prior 
documents, written memoranda from other sources. The 
Apostles themselves claimed credence for the story which 
they told, because they were telling what they had seen and 
heard. The number of the twelve, after the defection of 
Judas, was filled up by the choice of Matthias, that another 
witness, a companion of Christ, who had heard His teach- 
ing, and seen His works, might be provided (Acts i. 21, 22). 
We find that the Apostles limit their testimony to the 
period of their personal acquaintance with Christ; the first 
thirty years of His life—with the exception of a few inci- 
dents relating to His infancy and boyhood which were 
gathered up from oral sources—being passed over in silence. 
The laws that determine the credibility of history are re- 
spected in the composition of the sacred books. Contem- 
porary evidence is furnished; and the departures from 
this practice are the exceptions that prove the rule. 

The effect of the Harmonistic assumption, when applied 
in the concrete, is to lead to a mechanical combination of 
two or more relations, where a sound historical criticism 
would make a choice among diverse, and commonly unim- 
portant, particulars, or rectify in such points the statement 
of one Evangelist by the apparently fuller information of 
another. Thus in the accounts of the denial of Peter, there 
is not a precise accordance as to localities. With regard to 
the second denial, Mark says that the same maid (ἡ zacd¢oxn) 
put the question to which he responded; Matthew says, 
“another maid ;” while Luke makes it “another man” 


406 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


(&cspoc—se. ἄνθρωπος, ver. 58). This is a trifling diver- 
gence. It is a case where a narrator might not wish to 
be held responsible for a strictly accurate statement. But 
the older Harmonists, who conceived that the Evangelists 
must have written with the precision of a notary public, 
felt it necessary to avoid these variations by assuming that 
Peter’s denials reached the number of nine or ten; although 
as to the main fact that they were three in number—by 
which it is meant that there were no more, as well as no 
less than three—the Evangelists are united ; and such was 
unquestionably the real number. Out of a dread to admit 
the slightest inaccuracies in the Gospels, the Harmonists 
convert the evangelical history into a grotesque piece of 
mosaic. 

It may serve to illustrate both the mistaken, and the 
true, method of historical criticism as applied to the Guos- 
pels, if attention is called to a few passages where two or 
more of the Evangelists are compared with each other. 
Look, first, at the Sermon on the Mount. We pass by 
questions as to its chronological place. Luke makes it to 
have been delivered after Christ descended from the Mount 
to the plain, with His disciples. On this point, a recon- 
ciliation, if one seeks it, is not impossible; yet the ques- 
tion arises at once whether Luke does not follow a different 
tradition from that which is presented in Matthew. We 
omit, also, the question whether all that Matthew connects 
with the Sermon on the Mount—for example, the Lord’s 
Prayer—was uttered at that time, or whether utterances 
of Christ on other occasions are brought together by Mat- 
thew, as we might, perhaps, be led to infer from an inspec- 
tion of parallel passages which occur in other connections 
in Luke.’ We call attention to the beginning of the dis- 
course, which the two Evangelists present in common. 


1 See above, p. 376. 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 407 


Matthew writes: “Blessed are the poor in spirit,” and, 
“blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteous- 
ness.” Luke writes: “Blessed be ye poor;” ‘ Blessed 
are ye that hunger now;” and, as a counterpart, ‘ Woe 
unto you that are rich, for ye have received your conso- 


lation.” 
juxtaposition :— 


Marr. v. 2-4. 


2 And he opened his mouth, and 
taught them, saying, 

3 Blessed are the poor in spirit: 
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 

4 Blessed are they that hunger and 
thirst after righteousness: for they 


The following are the parallel passages, placed in 


LUKE τι. 20, 21, 24, 25. 

20 And he lifted up his eyes on 
his disciples, and said, Blessed be 
ye poor: for yours is the kingdom 
of God. 

21 Blessed are ye that hunger now: 
for ye shall be filled. Blessed are 


shall be filled. ye that weep now: for ye shall 


laugh. 


24 But woe unto you that are rich! 
for ye have received your consola- 
tion. 

25 Woe unto you that are full! 
for ye shall hunger. Woe unto you 
that laugh now! for yeshall mourn 
and weep. 


Now as Christ on that occasion said one or the other, 
either “ Blessed are the poor in spirit,” or “Blessed be ye 
poor,” and did not say both, we are driven to the inquiry, 
which is the more exact report? Did Luke abridge, or did 
Matthew amplify ? Critics may differ in opinion on this 
question, and the full discussion of it would lead us too 
far. Our own opinion is that the statements in Luke cor- 
respond most nearly to those actually uttered. The poor 
were gathered about Jesus ; their temporal condition—the 
hard circumstances of life—awakened in them humility 
and spiritual longing. For the reason, partly, that they 
were poor in purse they were poor in spirit. Christ said, 


408 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


“blessed be ye poor,” the implied condition being that 
spiritual poverty, which was shown by the way in which 
they flocked after Him, while the rich stood aloof, was the 


concomitant. 


Matthew’s addition is explanatory. 


It 


guards against a misunderstanding. 


Connected with the Sermon on the Mount is the account 
of the healing of the Centurion’s son :— 


Marr. vit. 5-13. 


5 And when Jesus was entered 
into Capernaum, there came unto 
him a centurion, beseeching him, 

6 And saying, Lord, my servant 
lieth at home sick of the palsy and 
grievously tormented. 

7 And Jesus said unto him, I will 
come and heal him. 

8 The centurion answered and 
said, Lord, I am not worthy that 
thou shouldest come under my roof: 
but speak the word only, and my 
servant shall be healed. 

9 For I amaman under autho- 
rity, having soldiers under me: 
and I say to this man, Go, and he 
goeth; and to another, Come, and 
he cometh; and to my servant, Do 
this, and he doeth it. 

10 When Jesus heard if, he mar- 
velled, and said to them that fol- 
lowed, Verily I say unto you, I 
have not found so great faith, no, 
not in Israel. 

11 And I say unto you, That many 
shall come from the east and west, 
and shall sit down with Abraham, 
and Isaac, and Jacob, in the king- 
dom of heaven : 

12 But the children of the king- 
dom shall be cast out into outer 


LUKE vit. 1-10. 


1 Now when he had ended all his 
sayings in the audience of the peo- 
ple, he entered into Capernaum. 

2 And a certain centurion’s ser- 
vant, who was dear unto him, was 
sick, and ready to die. 

3 And when he heard of Jesus, 
he sent unto him the elders of the 
Jews, beseeching him that he would 
come and heal his servant. 

4 And when they came to Jesus, 
they besought him instantly, say- 
ing, That he was worthy for whom 
he should do this: 

5 For he loveth our nation, and 
he hath built us a synagogue. 

6 Then Jesus went with them. 
And when he was now not far from 
the house, the centurion sent friends 
to him, saying unto him, Lord, 
trouble not thyself; for I am not 
worthy that thou shouldest enter 
under my roof: 

7 Wherefore neither thought I 
myself worthy to come unto thee: 
but say in a word, and my servant 
shall be healed. 

8 For I also am a man set under 
authority, having under me soldiers, 


/and I say unto one, Go, and he go- 
eth; and to another, Come, and he 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 


darkness: there shall be weeping 
and gnashing of teeth. 

13 And Jesus said unto the cen- 
turion, Go thy way; and as thou 
hast believed, so be it done unto 
thee. And his servant was healed 
in the self-same hour. 


409 


cometh; and to my servant, Do 
this, and he doeth 7. 

9 When Jesus heard these things, 
he marvelled at him, and turned 
him about, and said unto the people 
that followed him, I say unto you, 
I have not found so great faith, no, 


not in Israel. 

10 And they that were sent, re- 
| turning to the house, found the ser- 
vant whole that had been sick. 


In Matthew, the Centurion comes himself to Christ, and 
presents his entreaty in person. In Luke, it is the elders 
of the Jews who are deputed on this errand; and Luke 
reports no interview at all between the Centurion himself 
and the Saviour. Here it may be considered probable that 
the first Evangelist abridges the tale by the omission of in- 
cidents that were familiar to him. But the suggestion 
must occur to the historical student that possibly two 
separate traditions, differing from one another in the cir- 
cumstance of the deputation of the elders, appear in the 


several narratives. 


Turn to a later part of the evangelical history. Each 
of the first three Evangelists narrates a miracle of Jesus 
at a gate of Jericho :— 


Marr. xx. 29-34. 
29 And as they de- 


parted from Jericho, a 
great multitude follow- 
ed him. 

30 And, behold, two 
blind men sitting by 
the way-side, when they 
heard that Jesus passed 
by, cried out, saying, 


Have mercy on us, Ὁ 


Lord, thou Son of Da- 
vid. 
31 And the multitude 


LUKE xvii. 35-43; 

aD: G ile 

35 And it came to 
pass, that as he was 
come nigh unto Jeri- 
cho, a certain blind 
man sat by the way 
side begging : 

36 And hearing the 
multitude pass by, he 
asked what it meant. 

37 And they told him, 
that Jesus of Nazareth 
passeth by. 


MARK x. 46-52. 


46 And they came to 
Jericho: and ashe went 
out of Jericho with his 
disciples, and a great 
number of people, blind 
Bartimeus, the son of 
Timeus, sat by the 
highway side, begging. 


47 And when he heard 
thatit was Jesus of Na- 
zareth, he began to ery 
out, and say, Jesus, 


410 


rebuked them, because 
they should hold their 
peace: but they cried 
the more, saying, Have 
mercy on us, O Lord, 
thow Son of David. 

32 And Jesus stood 
still, and called them, 
and said, What will ye 
that I shall do unto 
you? 

33 They say unto 
him, Lord, that our 
eyes may be opened. 

34 So Jesus had com- 
passion on them, and 


touched their eyes: and | 


immediately their eyes 
received sight, and they 
followed him. 


38 And he cried, say- 
ing, Jesus thou Son of 
David, have mercy on 
me. 

39 And they which 
went before rebuked 
him, that he should 
hold his peace; but he 
cried somuch the more, 
Thou Son of Dayid, 
have mercy on me. 

40 And Jesus stood, 
and commanded him 
tobe brought unto him: 
and when he was come 
near, he asked him, 

41 Saying, What wilt 
thou that I shall do 
unto thee? And he 
said, Lord, that I may 
receive my sight. 

42 And Jesus said 
unto him, Receive thy 
sight: thy faith hath 
saved thee. 

43 And immediately 
he received his sight, 
and followed him, glo- 
rifying God: and all 
the people, when they 
saw it, gave praise unto 
God. 

44 And Jesus entered 
and passed through Je- 
richo. 


THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


‘thou Son of David, have 
mercy on me. 

48 And many charged 
him that heshould hold 
his peace: but he cried 
the more a great deal, 
Thow Son of David, 
have mercy on me. 

49 And Jesus stood 
still, and commanded 
him to be called. And 
they call the blind man, 
saying unto him, Be of 
good comfort, rise; he 
calleth thee. 

50 And he, casting 
away his garment, rose, 
and came to Jesus. 

51 And Jesus answer- 
ed and said unto him, 
What wilt thou that I 
should do unto thee? 
The blind man said 
unto him, Lord, that I 
might receive my sight. 

52 And Jesus said 
unto him, Go thy way; 
thy faith hath made 
thee whole. And im- 
mediately he received 
his sight, and followed 
Jesus in the way. 


Matthew speaks of two blind men; Mark and Luke of 


one 


It is quite possible that there were two, though the 


conversation of Jesus may have been with only one of 


them. 


But Matthew and Mark say distinctly that it was 


when Christ was leaving the city, while Luke says that it 
was when He drew nigh to the city. 


Here the Harmo- 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 411 


nists have supposed that Luke refers to a different miracle, 
performed earlier than that recorded by Matthew and 
Mark. But as the conversation reported by all the writers 
is substantially the same, and is peculiar, and neither 
notices more than one event of this kind at Jericho, that 
᾿ method of reconciliation is commonly abandoned. Another 
hypothesis is that Luke, in the word translated, “drew 
near,” means “was near,”—that is, near, but on his way 
out. The Greek word (¢77¢Zerv) is not absolutely incapable 
of such a rendering, though this meaning would be quite 
unexpected. But when we read in Luke, immediately after 
the account of the miracle:—“ And Jesus entered and passed 
through Jericho,” with which is coupled the statement of 
his conversation with Zaccheus, the critical feeling of a 
scholar repels this method of harmonizing as forced and 
unnatural; and it requires a great strength of dogmatic 
bias to withhold one from the conviction that here is a real, 
though not important, divergence. Blind men, and men- 
dicants of all sorts, took their station at the gates of cities. 
In the tradition which came to Luke, the miracle was 
placed at the gate by which Jesus entered ; in the tradition 
which appears in the other Evangelists, it was the gate by 
which he left. The discrepancy shows that there was no 
collusion between the evangelical historians. It confirms, 
rather than weakens, the evidences of Christianity. 

Many other diversities, most of them of minor conse- 
quence, present themselves on aclose scrutiny of the Gospel 
histories. We have space for but one. The first three Gos- 
pels have always been understood, and are almost univer- 
sally understood at present, to place the Last Supper on 
the evening when the Jews ate their passover. It is, also, 
the opinion of the great majority of exegetical scholars— 
including Neander, Bleek, Ewald, Meyer, Pressensé, Elli- 
cott, Wescott, Farrar—that John places the Last Supper 


412 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


on the evening of the day preceding the legal Passover, 
and the crucifixion on the morning when the Jews slew the 
lamb for this festival. If these positions are correct, 
there is a discrepancy in the chronology of the Evangelists 
here. Dr. Farrar states his conclusion thus: “To sum up, 
then, it seems to me, from careful and repeated study of 
much that has been written on this subject by many of the 
best and most thoughtful writers, that Jesus ate His Last 
Supper with the disciples on the evening of Thursday, Ni- 
san 13, ὁ. 6., at the time when, according to Jewish reckon- 
ing, the 14th of Nisan began; that this supper was not, 
and was not intended to be, the actual Paschal meal, which 
neither was, nor could be legally, eaten until the follow- 
ing evening; but by a perfectly natural identification, 
and one which would have been regarded as unimpor- 
tant, the Last Supper, which was a quasi-Passover, and 
one in which, as in its antetype, memories of joy and sorrow 
were strangely blended, got to be identified, even in the 
memory of the Synoptists, with the Jewish Passover, and 
that St. John, silently but deliberately, corrected this erro- 
neous impression, which, even in his time, had come to be 
generally prevalent.” 1 

Whatever may be thought of the correctness of the 
opinion expressed in this passage, it shows how the princi- 
ples of criticism which, for some time, have been almost 
unanimously accepted by scholars of the conservative 
schools on the continent, are making their way among 
orthodox divines in England. Richard Baxter, in his day, 
complained of those who assert that the Bible presents no 
signs of human imperfection, stake the truth of the Chris- 
tian religion upon the correctness of “every item of his- 
tory, genealogy, number, or word,” and assert that every 
one who doubts whether a single word is true, or was dic- 


1 Life of Christ, ii. 482. 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 413 


tated by the Holy Spirit, may, with equal reason, doubt 
the whole Gospel! “And here,” says Baxter, “I must tell 
you a great and needful truth, which ignorant Christians, 
fearing to confess, by overdoing tempt men to infidelity. 
The Scripture is like a man’s body, where some parts are 
for the preservation of the rest, and may be maimed with- 
out death. The sense is the soul of Scripture, and the 
letters but the body, or vehicle.”? Now, as always, it is 
essential to remember that the letter killeth. Concessions 
which the progress of Biblical criticism renders imperative, 
deprive infidelity of its most available weapon of attack 
upon the general credibility of the Gospel history. 

In the critical study of the New Testament histories, the 
fact must be considered that the matter contained therein 
existed for a time as an oral tradition before it was com- 
mitted to writing. It is, therefore, a: legitimate and una- 
voidable inquiry whether it underwent changes to which 
narratives of events, and reports of conversations and dis- 
courses are, under such circumstances, liable. The main 
point is whether the productive element was active in the 
minds of those who orally repeated this historical matter, 
in modifying it, especially through the incorporation with 
it of elements unconsciously supplied by the imagination. 
The assumption of such an agency of the mythopeeic ima- 
gination, has been used, as is well known, to cast a general 
discredit upon the Gospel histories. 

Against this assumption lies the known fact that the 
teaching of the Rabbis was accurately rehearsed and trans- 
mitted by their pupils. To attribute to the disciples of Jesus 
a like retentiveness of memory respecting words and acts 
by which they were so deeply impressed, is therefore not 
without a precedent, and a warrant in the habit of their 
countrymen at the time. So strong and so definite was the 


1 Meth. Theol., III. c. 15, pp. 200, 201. 2 Pract. Works, xx. 429. 


414 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


impression which Jesus made upon them that it is not too 
much to affirm respecting His actions and utterances gener- 
ally, that they would be indelibly stamped upon the re- 
collection of the witnesses. The identical words that He 
used, must, in many cases, have been imprinted upon the 
memory. 

Moreover, the early date of the Synoptical Gospels— 
which, besides, were not the first essays at recording the 
evangelical history—precludes the assumption to which we 
refer. The choice of the Apostles and their superinten- 
dence of the churches were not without a purpose and an 
effect. And before the Apostles passed off the stage, the 
testimony which they were in the habit of giving, was em- 
bodied in written Gospels. A question may arise, here 
and there, respecting a particular incident, or turn of ex- 
pression, on which critical scholars, not wanting in candor 
or in faith in the miraculous element of Christianity, may 
entertain a doubt. The narratives relating to the first 
thirty years of Jesus, not falling within the compass of 
Apostolic testimony as defined by Peter (Acts i. 22), are to 
be judged upon considerations peculiar to themselves. But 
the wholesale rejection of these narratives on this account 
is contrary to the sound principles of historical criticism. 
If here was ground on which the imagination would be 
tempted to dwell, it furnished also a stimulus to a sober 
curiosity on the part of Christians of the first generation, 
to ascertain facts respecting Jesus prior to His public min- 
istry ;' and such a curiosity might lead to inquiry among 
those who were personally cognizant of this portion of His 
life. 

The Gospels do not pretend to the character of elaborate, 
or artistic biographies. They are—especially the first two— 
from men unpracticed in literary composition. They fail 


1 See below, p. 420 seq. 


CRITICISM OF THE N. T. HISTORIES. 415 


to furnish with strictness the chronological order of events. 
They have a certain fragmentary aspect, as opposed to 
complete and rounded memoirs. Anecdotes are linked to- 
gether with no close bond of connection. Sayings of Jesus 
are set down, when much that He may have said in con- 
nection with them is left unrecorded. And yet, as pre- 
senting an authentic and a vivid portraiture of the Person 
who is the subject of these histories, it is probable that 
compositions of a more formal character could not possibly 
have equalled them. The Authors are lost in the subject ; 
they attempt no studied delineation of Jesus, but allow 
Him to stand in the foreground, and to speak and act for 
Himself. There is aseries of sketches, faithful to the reality, 
linked one to another with little outlay of art, yet so that 
together they exhibit the perfect character and life in a 
shape apprehensible to the imagination. No one who 
reads the Gospels need be at a loss to conceive of the man- 
ner in which Jesus lived from day to day, of the labors of 
mercy which He performed, or of the mode and substance 
of His teachings. 


416 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER XIII. 


JOHN THE BAPTIST AND THE BEGINNING OF THE MINISTRY 
OF JESUS. 


WHATEVER difficulties may arise respecting details here 
and there in the Gospel narrative, the strongly marked 
portraits of John the Baptist and of Jesus, each so distinct 
and in so striking contrast with the other, prove the essen- 
tial verity, to say the least, of the historical records from 
which our conception of both is derived. 

The Messianic expectation was too deeply imbedded in 
the structure of the Old Testament religion ever to be ex- 
tirpated. The hopes of the people might at one time be 
directed predominantly to the general characteristics of the 
Messianic time, while the thought of the Person through 
whom the great work of renovation and victory was to be 
accomplished, might retreat into the background. Yet the 
conception of the Messiah in His personal character never 
died out, and, under favoring conditions, burst forth into 
fresh life. But the more exalted and holy this personage 
was conceived to be, and the more vivid was the sense of 
moral degeneracy and corruption in the minds of devout 
Israelites, the deeper was the conviction that a preparatory 
work must precede His appearance, and that a Prophet 
must arise to effect a reform, and pave the way for the 
Messiah’s coming. In no other way could impending 
judgments, which only waited to be executed until the hour 
of the Messiah’s advent, be averted. The expectation of a 


JOHN THE BAPTIST. 417 


forerunner associated itself with the Prophet Elijah. That, 
although he had gone from the earth, he still lived, and 
might reappear, either to thunder forth warnings and 
rebukes such as he had uttered to the apostate king Ahab 
and the devotees of Baal, or to rekindle the spirit of loyalty 
to God in the rebellious nation, became a common belief. 
The closing words of the Old Testament, from the pen of 
Malachi, were a prediction, which many construed in a 
literal sense, that Elijah was to be sent “before the coming 
of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.”? 

The voice of the last prophet had long been silent, but 
many souls were longing for the Deliverer to arise, when, 
“in the wilderness of Judea,” the wild and thinly settled 
region lying to the westward of the Dead Sea, a Preacher 
appeared, who in his garb, and tone, and manner of life, 
as well as in his utterances, called to mind the austere Pro- 
phet of Gilead and Mount Carmel. His clothing was a 
rough cloak, or mantle, of camel’s hair, thrown over the 
shoulders, and a belt of skin worn about his loins; his 
hair was shaggy and unshorn ; his food was of the simplest 
sort, consisting of locusts and the juice that fell from the 
tamarisks, or, perhaps, the honey furnished by the wild 
bees of that sombre and desolate region, where, like monks 
of later ages, he had taken up his abode. No doubt the 
disciples, who were more or less closely attached to him, 
followed his example as well as precept, when they fasted 
often.” The “city of Judah,” where John was born is 
thought by some to be Jutta, but was not improbably He- 
bron, the city where was the sepulchre of Abraham, the 
city which was assigned to the Levites, and in which’ 
David commenced to reign. He was of priestly descent, 
belonging to one of the four and twenty families who min- 
istered in regular order in the temple, the son of parents 


1 Mal. iv. 5. 6. 2 Luke y. 33, Mark ii. 18. 
27 


418 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


who had consecrated him, according to the rule prescribed 
for Nazarites,’ to a life of abstemiousness and devotion. 
How long he had lived as a hermit before he began to 
collect disciples around him, and to make his voice ring in 
the ears of the multitude, we have no means of determining. 
His honesty, fearlessness, and humility are his most con- 
spicuous traits. Here was not one clad “in soft clothing” 
who had been brought up in kings’ houses.?___ Here “ was 
no reed, shaken by the winds ;”* but an inspired soul, 
liberated from all dread of man, elevated above the in- 
fluence of selfish passion, and himself schooled to practice 
the virtues which he demanded of others. Josephus, in 
the notice which he gives of him, agrees with the Gospel 
history in lauding his goodness. * 

John can be identified with no previously existing sect. 
He differed from the Essenes in his outward garb, and in 
requiring but one baptism, while frequent lustrations were 
a prominent part of the Essenian cultus. Still more at 
variance was he with this sect in the spirit of his teaching, 
where mystical contemplation finds no place, and in the 
active and aggressive character of his whole work. Besides 
the Essenes, it is probable that, in that corrupt and troubled 
time, individuals, disconnected from any sect, withdrew 
from society and took up their abode in these barren and 
secluded places. Josephus relates that he lived for three 
years with one of this class named Banus, who dwelt in the 
desert, and used no other clothing than grew upon trees, 
and had no other food than the products that grew wild, 
and bathed frequently in cold water. This recluse Josephus 
expressly distinguishes from the Essenes and the other 
sects.> In John there is no trace of any doctrine or ob- 
servance not in harmony with the principles of the Old 


1 Lukei. 15. 2 Matt. xi. 8, Luke vii. 25. 
3 Matt. xi.7, Luke vii. 24. ‘4 Antiq., xviii. v.2. ὅ Vita, 22. 


JOHN THE BAPTIST. 419 


Testament religion, and the observances of the Mosaic 
law. 

In his preaching there were two prime elements. “ Re- 
pent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” was the sum 
of his discourse. Repentance must be thorough,—no mere 
ceremonial purification ; but such an abandonment of sin as 
the Prophet Isaiah had demanded.’ Every man, and every 
class of men, were to cease from the sin peculiar to them- 
selves. The soldier was to abstain from violence; the tax- 
gatherer from extortion ; and every one was generously to 
help his neighbor. Seeing in the crowd before him those 
who belonged to the ruling class, Pharisees who prided 
themselves on their sanctity, and, according to Matthew, 
Sadducees also, he addressed them as a brood of vipers, and 
demanded to know who had warned them to flee from the 
wrath to come. Hopes founded merely on Hebrew descent 
were worthless. God out of these stones— from the heathen, 
despised as they were—could raise up children to Abra- 
ham.’ The second element in the Baptist’s preaching, the 
grand motive to repentance, was the nearness of the king- 
dom. The hour of division and of separation was at 
hand! The axe was to be laid to the root of the tree! 
Every unworthy member of the community of God was to 
be cut off. The Messiah was to separate the chaff from the 
wheat, and to burn up the chaff with inextinguishable fire ! 
The baptism of water was to be followed with baptism in 
the Holy Ghost, and in fire; for the penitent, in the Holy 
Ghost, purifying and imparting a new principle of moral 
life; and, for those who were evil, immersion in fire. Thus 
Him who was to come after, John described as mightier 
than himself, as One for whom he felt himself unworthy to 
perform the most menial office.‘ 


1 Ts. i. 16-18. ? Luke iii. 7. Cf. Matt. iii. 7. 
* Matt. iii. 11. See Meyer, in loco. 4 Matt. iii, 11. 


420 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Baptism was something not unfamiliar to the Jews. The 
proselytes from the heathen were baptized. Every syna- 
gogue was built, if possible, near a stream of water. Bath- 
ing, as a religious act, as we have said, was one of the note- 
worthy practices of the Essenes. The baptism of John was 
an act symbolical of repentance; an initiation, too, into the 
company of those who were to be in readiness for the mani- 
festation of the Messiah. 

Independently of the Gospels, Josephus is a witness to 
the profound impression made by the Prophet of the wilder- 
ness.!_ Crowds journeyed to hear him, and to be baptized 
in the sacred waters of the Jordan. The excitement spread 
over Judea, and the region east of the river, and extended 
even into Galilee. But John was not tempted by this po- 
pularity to entertain any higher idea of his own function. 
To the questions of a deputation of Priests, with Levites for 
their coadjutors, who were sent to him by the Sanhedrim, 
he replied that he was not the Christ, was not Elijah, not 
the Prophet predicted in Deuteronomy, who was not uni- 
formly identified with the Messiah, but that he was the 
Voice of one crying in the wilderness, and summoning the 
people to prepare for the Lord.?, His whole end and aim 
was to do the work of the herald whom Isaiah had foretold. 

We have now to consider the direct connection of Jesus 
with John. Of the early life of Jesus we have no infor- 
mation except what is drawn from the introductory por- 
tions of Matthew and Luke. Mark, the earliest of the 
Evangelists, begins with the public ministry of Jesus; and 
the same is true of John, the latest, who aims to set forth 
the historical facts of which he had been a witness, and on 
which his own faith rested. It is evident that the accounts 
of the birth and childhood of Jesus which are presented by 
Matthew and Luke respectively, were derived from differ- 


τ Antiq:, xviii. 5., 2. 2 John i. 19 seq. 


THE CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. 421 


ent sources. This lends support to their credibility, at 
least on the points where they are in agreement with one 
another. It is not improbable that Mary herself was the 
ultimate source of these traditions. After the Ascension of 
Jesus she resided at Jerusalem. Twice Luke refers to the 
mother of Jesus in a way to countenance the supposition 
that his accounts had been derived, directly or indirectly, 
from her: “ Mary kept all these things and pondered them 
in her heart ;” “but His mother kept all these sayings in 
her heart.” * Circumstances which, if known to others, 
might be effaced from memory by the long years in which 
Jesus dwelt in the household, giving no visible sign of His 
Messianic calling, were indelibly imprinted upon her mind. 
The incredulity of the rest of His family when He began 
His ministry, and the faith of His mother, as evinced at 
the wedding of Cana, when she prompted Him to re- 
veal his power, are thus equally explained.” The sup- 
position that the narratives of the miraculous birth and of 
the infancy are nothing but the early Christian poesy with 
which the imagination, under the influence of the ministry, 
miracles, and resurrection of Jesus, invested the beginning 
of His life, is exposed to grave difficulties. The accounts 
in Luke unquestionably formed a part of his Gospel from 
its first composition, and were drawn from a written, and 
that a Jewish-Christian, source; as the Hebrew diction 
which is still left upon them attests. The accounts in 
Matthew are likewise homogeneous with the rest of the 
book, and not a later addition. The narratives of the 
miraculous conception, which are found in both Luke and 
Matthew, the visit of the Magi, the slaughter of the chil- 
dren at Bethlehem, and the flight into Egypt, which are 
found exclusively in Matthew; the sublime and beautiful 
incident relative to the shepherds, and the other prior cir- 


1 Luke ii. 19, 51. 2 John ii. 3, 5. 


422 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


cumstances which are peculiar to Luke, contain, as to their 
substance, nothing in itself incredible to one who admits 
the supernatural in the mission and life of Jesus. And 
without this admission, they would be inexplicable, re- 
garded as unconscious poesy. Considered from the his- 
torical point of view, these various incidents, however, rest 
upon a different ground from the narrations of which the 
Apostles were direct witnesses ; but this fact constitutes no 
valid ground for the sweeping criticism which rejects all this 
introductory portion of the Gospel history.! The chrono- 
logical difficulties, and other difficulties of that sort, are no 
greater than generally belong to a collection of historical 
anecdotes, however authentic; especially where each of 
two or more writers introduces certain circumstances not 
known to the others.” The flight into Egypt may have 
taken place after the presentation of Jesus in the temple. 
Of the circumstances that led to the flight, it may be here 
observed that they are not at all incongruous with the 
savage deeds of Herod in his last days. In his last illness, 
he shut up the principal men of all Judea in the hippo- 
drome at Jericho, and ordered Salome, his sister, at the 
moment of his decease to have them slaughtered by the 
soldiers, that there might be wailing after his death.? The 
silence of Josephus respecting the massacre at Bethlehem is 
not more remarkable than his deliberate silence respecting 
everything concerning Jesus ; for the brief passage alluding 
to Him is much interpolated, if not wholly spurious.’ 
With respect to whatever relates to the Messianic ideas of 


1 See the reasoning of Neander upon the improbability that the story 
of the miraculous conception could arise as a myth among the Jews, and 
upon the intrinsic probability of the other introductory narratives in 
Matthew and Luke. Leben Jesu, pp. 14-53. 

? See above, p. 400. 


5 Josephus, Antiq., xvii. 6, 5. 4 Antiq., xviii. 3, 3. 


THE CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. 423 


the Jews, Josephus, out of regard to Roman jealousies and 
prejudices, practices the most discreet reserve. 

Both the genealogies, it is now generally allowed, are of 
Joseph, his reputed father. The descent of Jesus from 
David was never questioned, as it would have been if there 
had been any ground for doubt on the point. The descent 
of Mary, likewise, from David, if not explicitly attested, 
is not excluded by anything stated in the Gospels. Both 
Evangelists unite in the statement that Jesus was born in 
Bethlehem, in Judea.’ There is nothing in Matthew to 
imply a knowledge on his part that Bethlehem was only a 
place of temporary sojourn for His parents. It is repre- 
sented that they chose Nazareth for a residence to escape 
from the tyranny of Archelaus.* Luke is more full 
here. The difficulty arising from the association with a 
taxing at that time, is not yet cleared up; ? but, apart 
from this chronological point, the main fact of a visit 


1Christ was born four years before our present era. Herod died either 
A. τ. c. 750 or 751. But the beginning of our era is synchronous with 
A. u. c. 754. If, as is probable, Luke (iii. 23) regards the 15th year 
of Tiberius, as A. τ΄. c. 780, when Tiberius became joint Emperor with 
Augustus, this would give A. vu. c. 750 as the date of his birth, since at 
the time designated by Luke he was about 30 years old. 

2 Matt. ii. 22. 

3 Josephus states that Quirinus (Cyrenius) became Governor of Syria 
A. D. 6, and that the taxing under him took place immediately (A. p. 7). 
See Antig. xvii. 13,5; xviii. 1,1; xviii. 2. The Governor of Syria in 
the last days of Herod, and the Governor who suppressed the insurrec- 
tion immediately after his death, was Quintilius Varus (Jos., Antiq., 
xvii. 5, 2; 9,3; 10, 9; 11,1). It has been made probable that 
Quirinus was twice governor of Syria. For the evidence, see Schiirer, 
N. T. Zeitgesch., p. 161. Upon the whole subject (including a con- 
sideration of Zumpt’s theory that Quirinus, in his first governorship 
completed a census which Varus had begun), see Meyer, Komm. uber 
das Evang. Lucas. (Luke ii. 1), and especially Schiirer, pp. 262-286. 
For the relation of the question to the credibility of Luke, see Neander, 
Leben Jesu, Ὁ. 32 n., Farrar, Life of Christ, 1. 7, π. ἃ. For an examina- 
tion of Zumpt’s theory, see Dr. Woolsey, Bib. Dict., Art., Cyrenius. 


424 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


of Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem, in connection with 
a general taxation, or enrollment, stands intact. It is 
not impossible that they intended to transplant their abode 
to Bethlehem, but were prevented from doing so by the 
fear excited by Herod and by Archelaus. On some such 
hypothesis, the statements of the two Evangelists might 
be reconciled. But, not to dwell on these minor circum- 
stances, it is certain that the parents of Jesus came back to 
Nazareth; He was known as a Nazarene. Four of his 
brothers, born, there is no sufficient reason to doubt, after 
this date, are mentioned by name,—James, Joses, Simon 
and Judas, of whom James and Judas, after the Ascension, 
became leading Disciples ; and there were, also, several sis- 
ters, married, we may infer, at Nazareth, since it is not 
stated that they accompanied the rest of the family on 
their removal to Capernaum.' In this humble household, 


“subject to His parents,” Jesus “increased in wisdom and 


1 Matt. xiii. 55. There were two Disciples in the number of the 
Twelve, who bore the name of James, viz., James, the son of Zebedee, 
and brother of John, and James the son of Alpheus. Was James, the 
“brother of the Lord,” who was a sort of presiding elder, or bishop, in 
the Church at Jerusalem, identical with James the son of Alpheus ? 
Some have answered in the affirmative, believing that the term “bro- 
ther” in the designation of James as “brother of the Lord,” signifies 
cousin. According to this view, the “brethren” of Jesus were children 
neither of Joseph or Mary. This was the opinion of Jerome; but it 
rests on no solid foundation. Epiphanius advanced an opinion, in which 
he was followed by many of the Fathers, that the “brethren” of Jesus 
were children of Joseph by a former marriage. If this were so, it would 
be difficult to explain the language of the Evangelists (Matt. i. 25; Luke 
ii. 7), in which Jesus is called the “ first-born son” of Mary. This more 
naturally implies that she afterwards became the mother of other child- 
ren. (See Meyer, and Bleek’s Synopt. Erkl. d. drei erst. Evangg., in loco). 
Prof. Lightfoot, who favors the theory of Epiphanius (Galatians, p. 264), 
finds a decisive argument in favor of it in John xix. 26,27. John took 
Mary to his own home. “Is it conceivable,” it is asked, “ that our Lord 
would thus have snapped the most sacred ties of natural affection?” In 


THE CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. 425 


stature, and in favor with God and man.”! “ And the 
child grew,” Luke also says, and “ waxed strong ’—‘“ in 
spirit ” are words interpolated in the text—“ filled with 
wisdom, and the grace of God was upon Him.”? Both 
passages refer to the physical as well as mental and moral 
development of the child Jesus. In illustration of the 
character of the child as thus described, Luke had obtained 
a knowledge of one deeply interesting incident, the tarrying 
of Jesus, then at the age of twelve, in the temple, where 
He was found absorbed in conversation with the doctors, 
and His explanation to His parents that He must be about 
His Father’s business ; or, as the expression should proba- 
bly be understood, must be in His Father’s house. There, 
He meant to say, was the place where they should naturally 
look for Him. The expression involves a deep sense, too 
deep for Him then to define in words, of His peculiar 
calling and relation to God. 


But it is implied by Luke that these indications of an 
exceptional mental and religious quality, chiefly impressed 
his mother. There was nothing in the pure and blameless 
child, either then or as He grew up to manhood, assisting 
Joseph in his occupation as a carpenter,* to impress His 
brothers and sisters, or His townsmen, with the idea that He 
was destined for an exalted mission. This is shown by the 
way that His family regarded Him, after He had entered 


answer to this, it may be said that, on the supposition that the “ bre- 
thren” were children of Joseph, they had dwelt long in the family of 
Mary, and it might naturally have been expected that she would remain 
under the care of one of them. But it is quite conceivable that there may 
have been good reasons why she could not conveniently take up her 
abode with them, whether they were her natural offspring, or her child- 
ren by marriage. The early sentimentin favor of the perpetual virginity 
of Mary deprives the sanction, which is given by the Fathers to the Epiphas 
nian theory, of the weight which it might otherwise have. 


1 Luke ii. 51, 52. 2 Ver. 49. Σ᾿ Mark vi. 3. 


426 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


upon His ministry, when they supposed Him to be out of 
His mind ;' and by the incredulous exclamations of the 
inhabitants of the town when He appearéd in their syn- 
agogue.* Nazareth lay in a green valley among the 
high hills of Galilee, not far below their topmost ridges. 
There, at a height of eight hundred feet above the level of 
the sea, inclosed in fifteen of those gently rounded hills 
which rise about it like the edge of a shell, was the se- 
cluded village where Jesus passed the first thirty years of 
His life2 From the heights above the town—“ the brow 
of the hill on which the city was built—”* there spreads 
out one of the grandest views in all Palestine. The wide 
circuit which the eye traverses, includes on the south and 
southeast, the plain of Esdraelon, the theatre of so many 
battles ; on the West, Mount Carmel and the Mediterra- 
nean; while to the East and to the North rise the dome- 
like top of Tabor, and the snowy summit of Hermon. In 
the midst of this scene, so rich in natural beauty, and in 
sacred associations of historic interest, under the quicken- 
ing influence of the Scriptures of the Old Testament, in a 
household pervaded by the spirit of godly devotion, whose 
members yearly went up to the Passover, there was un- 
folded that mind “lofty beyond all human comparison, 
whose creative thoughts were to fertilize the spiritual life 
of man through all ages, and whose creative power sprang 
from its mysterious union with that Divine Word which 
gave birth to all things.” No eminent character in history 
has owed less to external agencies. It is true that back 
of him lay the whole history of Israel, and that divine 
training which had stretched over a period of two thou- 
sand years. But in his immediate antecedents, when com- 
pared with the circumstances of others in his own nation, 


1 Mark iii. 21, John vii. 5. 2 Luke iv. 22. Cf. John vi. 42. 
3 See Stanley, Sinai and Palestine, pp. 357, 358. 4 Luke iv. 29. 


JESUS THE MESSIAH. 427 


there was nothing out of which pre-eminence could be pre- 
dicted. Nazareth, apparently for some other reason be- 
sides its insignificance, was held in disesteem.! In the 
case of Jesus, the sources of wisdom and power were from 
within. 

Among those who presented themselves to John for 
baptism was Jesus of Nazareth. The brief narratives of 
the Evangelists do not enable us to determine whether they 
had ever met one another before. If, as Luke relates, they 
were kinsmen, they had been widely separated, and John’s 
manner of life would have hindered intercourse between 
them. The recognition of Jesus as the Messiah by John, 
has been called in question by certain modern critics.? If 
there was this recognition, it has been asked, why did not 
John himself join the company of the disciples of Jesus ? 
Why did he not publicly proclaim Jesus as the Christ ? 
How shall we explain it that John went on with his work; 
that his disciples were jealous of Jesus ;* that, at a much 
later day, they existed as a separate body, not included 
among Christian believers? How shall we account for it 
that John himself, when he heard of what Jesus was doing, 
sent his disciples to inquire if he was in truth the Christ ? ἢ 
These questions deserve an answer. They present pro- 
blems analogous to those which frequently arise in the field 
of history, where our information is scanty and fragmen- 
tary. A judicious criticism, in such cases, does not cut 
the knot which it should rather seek to untie. A capital 
fact to be kept in mind is that John stood at the point of 
transition between the old dispensation and the new. He 
belonged to the former; but foregleams from the coming 
day were cast back upon him. Glimpses, rather than 


1 See Smith’s Bible Dictionary, Art., Nazaret. 
? Hausrath, i. 320. 3 John iii. 25, 26. 
* Matt. xi. 8, Luke vii. 19. 


428 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


a permanent vision, were granted him of the kingdom 
which it was his lofty function to usher in. The Evan- 
gelists unite in testifying that, in connection with the 
baptism of Jesus, John recognized Him as the Messiah 
for whom he was looking; that Jesus was manifested in 
this character by a supernatural sign—a dove-like appear- 
ance, symbolical of the Spirit—resting upon His head. The 
Evangelist who does not explicitly record the fact of the 
baptism of Jesus, but refers to it and implies it,’ represents 
the Baptist as saying that he had not previously known 
Him, but that he knew Him through the sign by which it 
had been revealed to himself that the Messiah should be 
recognized. Upon the authority of this Evangelist, we 
may safely conclude that the sign in question was for the 
Baptist himself, to qualify him to give his testimony to 
Jesus. This does not preclude the conversation which 
preceded, when John expressed his unfitness to baptize 
one like Jesus, and Jesus overruled the objection on the 
ground that it behooved Him to fulfil all righteousness— 
everything in the divinely appointed order.” This con- 
versation would imply, to be sure, a degree of knowledge 
of Jesus, a perception of His purity, and, it may be, of the 
exalted work in store for Him ; but there was not that pre- 
appointed and absolute proof which empowered John to 
give solemn and public testimony. In this sense, he did 
not know Him prior to the sign from heaven. The essential 
truth of these narrations is established by an argument which 
is independent of the question of the credibility of the Evan- 
gelist.* The baptism of John was the baptism of repent- 
ance for the remission of sins. It needs no argument to show 
that Jesus did not come, confessing sin, with stains of guilt 
to be washed away. He must have received baptism, un- 


1 John i. 32-34. 2 Matt. iii. 14-16. 
5 Cf. Neander, Leben Jesu (5th ed.), pp. 88, 89. 


BAPTISM OF JESUS. 429 


der a different idea, and with another intent. There must 
have been a mutual understanding and a previous confer- 
ence between him and John; and thus a strong anterior 
probability is attached to the Gospel narratives of this 
transaction. ὦ 

To the Baptist himself the baptism of Jesus was a full 
authentication of His Messianic calling: it was the intro- 
duction of the new kingdom. In reference to the people, 
it was a symbol of the repentance required for admission 
into it. With respect to Jesus Himself, it was an inaugu- 
ration and consecration to His work. It did not signify 
that then for the first time He became aware of His voca- 
tion; for this was a conviction, there is every reason to 
conclude, that arose from within, and was due to no sudden 
outward occurrence. Nor did it signify that, up to that 
time, the Spirit was not with Him. But that was the hour 
when in His inward development He had reached the point 
of readiness for commencing His public ministry, and when, 
through the power of the Spirit, He was to be qualified for 
performing the miracles and other works belonging to this 
divine calling. 

That John should characterize Him as the Lamb of God 
who taketh away the sin of the world, as the Fourth Gos- 
pel records, has been thought by some to be impossible at 


1 At that sublime moment in the history of mankind, wher Jesus met 
John upon the banks of the Jordan, critics who never err on the side of 
credulity, feel constrained to admit something like a miracle. Keim 
says of this event: —“‘ Auf diesen mitrathenden, thatenden entschei- 
denden Gott, der sie sendet, laufen alle ihre Reden, zumal die Reden 
Jesu zuriick ; unser historisches Gewissen zwingt uns zuzugestehen, dass 
sie aus diesem Bewusstsein gehandelt, und unser Denken striubt sich 
nicht anzuerkennen, dass sie nicht aus irrendem Bewusstsein handelten, 
dass géttliche Veranstaltungen und Erleuchtungen am Jordan lagerten, 
und dass ein gottliches Wirken und Regieren die grosste That und die 
grosste Wendung der Menscheitsgeschichte begleiten musste.” fe- 
schichte Jesu, i. 549. 2 John i. 36. 


430 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the point of view where John stood. But this passage from 
the Prophet Isaiah, where the Baptist found the inspired 
description of his own function and work, might occur to 
his mind, as a flash of light, on an occasion when he saw 
Jesus walking near, and marked, it may be, an aspect of 
gentleness in His mien and look. Such a perception might 
indicate a momentary illumination rather than a fixed con- 
ception! The exclamation that God could raise up children 
to Abraham from the stones,” likewise surpassed the ordi- 
nary Jewish expectation. 

It comported with the humble feeling of John and with 
his well-defined conception of the restricted nature of his 
own work, that he should leave the Messiah to establish 
His kingdom in His own time and way. He might 
point a few of his disciples, whose minds were inquisitive 
and susceptible, to Jesus; but, for himself, it belonged to 
him to go on with the labor appointed for him, of exciting 
the people to repentance, and of making ready for the new 
order of things, the precise nature of which would have 
been beyond his ken. For a while, the two Teachers 
taught contemporaneously, each laboring at the founda- 
tions of the kingdom in his own way. That disciples of 
John, more zealous for their master than he was for him- 
self, should be disturbed when One whom he had baptized, 
was drawing after Him a portion of the multitude that had 
flocked after the Baptist in the wilderness, was not unnat- 
ural, nor contrary to experience. But how shall we ex- 
plain John’s own doubt, at a later day, after he had been 
thrown into prison?* This, too, was not unnatural. 
Events were not taking the shape which accorded with any 
anticipation that he had been able to form. Though a 
spiritual man, and insisting with all energy on righteous: 


! See above, p. 356, 2 Matt. iii. 9: Luke iii. 8. 
» P ἢ 
3 Matt. xi, 3, Luke vii. 19. 


TEMPTATION OF JESUS. 431 


ness as the essence of the divine requirements, there is no 
reason to suppose that he was so much more enlightened 
than the disciples of Jesus, as to have risen altogether 
above the notion of an external theocracy. It is possible, 
yet it is gratuitous to suppose, that depression consequent 
on a suspension of his work and confinement in prison— 
where, however, his disciples had access to him—contribu- 
ted to excite a temporary doubt in his mind. He was 
“not a reed shaken by the winds.” Why then should we 
detract anything from his heroic constancy? 'The words 
of Jesus to those who were to report to John the miracles 
which they had seen—miracles which Isaiah had described 
as badges of the Messiah—were: ‘Blessed is he who is 
not offended (μὴ σχανδαλισθη) in me!’ These words point 
clearly to the perplexity or disappointment which His 
failure to make a grand public demonstration of power 
might easily excite. Do they not suggest that the ques- 
tion of the Baptist had its origin in such a feeling ? 

After the record of the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan, 
there follows, in the first three Gospels, the account of the 
Temptation, when He spent “ forty days’”—whether to be 
taken literally, or as a round number, is uncertain—in the 
same wilderness of Judea where John first uttered his fiery 
appeals. In that mountainous, infertile, sparsely settled 
region, withdrawn from intercourse with men, Jesus girded 
Himself for the mighty task which lay before him—a task 
that involved a withstanding unto death of the solicitations 
that must arise on every side, so deep and universal was 
the demand for some sort of a temporal monarchy of which 
the Messiah should be the Head. The Synoptists, Mark, 
the oldest of them, included, all record the fact of the 
Temptation, and place it at the same point in the history. 
It is not such a fact as the imagination, in the absence of 
any historical basis for it, would naturally call into being. 


A32 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Nor is the omission of it by John remarkable, when we 
consider the special end which dictates his selection of 
matter. In the chronology of John, it may find a place 
just before the account of the deputation sent from Jerusa- 
lem to interrogate the Baptist (i. 19). 

When we pass beyond the Temptation, and investigate 
the early part of the Saviour’s ministry, we find chreno- 
logical data in the Synoptists, as compared with John, 
which do not admit of an easy adjustment. This grows 
out of the omission by the former of so great a part of the 
Judean ministry of Jesus, At the imprisonment of John, 
they tell us, Jesus went into Galilee, and entered upon His 
Galilean ministry.’ They do not, however, say that the 
seizure of John followed at once upon the baptism of Je- 
sus, nor, with the exception of the notice of the Temptation, 
do they state anything that occurred in the interval. John 
fills up the gap.? He tells us how two of the disciples of 
John the Baptist, of whom one was Andrew, and the other, 
as there is no room for doubt, was the Evangelist himself, 
saw the Baptist point to Jesus and describe Him as the 
Lamb of God.’ He tells us, from his vivid recollection of 
that most important event of his life, that it was four o’clock 
in the afternoon, when he and Andrew followed Jesus to 
His lodging-place, and remained with Him through the 
day.* It was the next day after the Jewish deputies had 
conferred with the Baptist.° Andrew “ first” found his 
brother Simon—the expression implies that John, too, 
was looking for his brother (James), but -that Andrew suc- 
ceeded first in finding the one of whom he was in quest. 
According to the Synoptists, also, Simon and Andrew, 
James and John, are the first, and the four most conspicu- 
ous, disciples. Their permanent attachment to Jesus in 


1 Matt. iv. 12, 17: “From that time,” ete. 
2 See John iii. 24. * John i. 35-40. 4 Ver. 39. 5 Ver. 35. 


NATHANAEL. 433 


this character, as we may reasonably believe, occurred later, 
according to the narrative of the Synoptists, when they 
laid down their occupation and followed Him. Thus it 
was from the circle of John the Baptist, as was quite 
natural, that the first nucleus was formed of that company 
which became the chosen companions of Jesus. At the 
outset, Jesus gave to Simon the name of Peter, the Rock,' 
for the quality which He discerned at a glance in this 
earnest and devoted leader of the band of His immediate 
followers. The passage in Matthew (xvi. 18), in which 
Jesus addresses Peter as the Rock, does not imply that on 
this last occasion he first received the appellation, but 
rather that his confession of faith was in keeping with the 
name which he already bore.*? On the day following, 
Jesus set out for Galilee, and called into His company, 
another disciple, Philip, who was from Bethsaida, the home 
of Andrew and Peter.* Somewhere, as they were on the 
way, Philip found a friend, Nathanael, who is not impro- 
bably the Bartholomew with whom the name of Philip, in 
the list of Apostles, is generally linked. Nathanael, at 
first incredulous on hearing that Jesus was from Nazareth, 
a place from which he could expect nothing good to come, 
was impressed with the penetrating judgment which 
Jesus expressed concerning him, of the truth of which he 
might, without pride, be conscious; and still more by the 
remark of Jesus that he had seen him when he was under 
a fig-tree, where, it may be, he recollected that, according 
to an ancient custom, he had gone for meditation, and 
where his thoughts had been absorbed in the things per- 
taining to the kingdom of God. This evidence that Jesus 
knew what was in man, which had evoked faith in the mind 
of the honest Israelite, would be followed, Jesus assured 
him, with far more striking evidences of a direct relation, 


os ohn i. 42. 7 See Meyer, in loco. 3 John i. 44. 


434 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


on His part, to God, and of converse with the supernatural 
world.’ 

On the third day—the reckoning is probably from his 
departure for Galilee (i. 483)—we find Jesus, in company 
with His mother and His disciples, at a wedding in Cana. 
Here began the exertion of His miraculous power. The 
supply of wine gave out, and Mary, who was waiting for 
the manifestation of that power which, as she felt assured, 
dwelt in Him, reported to Him the fact in a way to suggest 
that here was the occasion to exert it.” His reply, though 
not harsh, as it may seem, involved the idea that the use of 
this power, like every other step which He should take in 
the prosecution of His work, was to be prompted from 
above, and not to be subject to human interference. The 
moment when, and the manner how, this manifestation of 
His “glory” should take place, it was left to the divine 
will to direct. In the nature and occasion of this miracle, 
how strong is the contrast exhibited between Jesus and the 
Forerunner, “ who came neither eating nor drinking !” * 


From Cana He went on, with His mother, brothers, and 
disciples, to Capernaum.* This flourishing town upon the 
borders of the Lake became the abode of His family, and 
the centre of His labors in Galilee. But on this occasion 
He remained there only a short time.® The occurrence of 
the Passover led Him to goup to Jerusalem. At this time 
it was that, impelled by zeal for the sanctity of the Tem- 
ple, His Father’s House, He drove the money-changers, 
and other traffickers, with the animals that were offered for 
sale, out of the Court of the Gentiles. His blended words 


1 John i. 51. 
® This interpretation we adopt, against Meyer in loco. See Neander, Le- 
ben Jesu, p. 271. 


3 Matt. xi. 18; Luke vii. 88. * John ii. 12. 
5 John ii. 12. 


NICODEMUS. 435 


and acts, and the air of authority and righteous indignation 
that accompanied them, disarmed resistance. It was an 
appropriate beginning of His ministry at Jerusalem; a 
deed in keeping with the labors of the Baptist which had 
gone before, and the offspring of that prophetic ardor which 
broke forth as a flame, as we shall see, in His opening 
ministry in Galilee. During this visit to Jerusalem, oc- 
curred, also, the interview with Nicodemus, a member of 
the Sanhedrim, who was impressed by the miracles which 
Jesus had done, but not being fully decided in his own 
mind as to His Messianic claims, or not caring to incur the 
consequences of a public committal in His favor, came to 
him by night. The effect of the conversation is not stated ; 
but Nicodemus appears twice afterward in the narrative of 
John, first as remonstrating against the condemnation of Je- 
sus without a hearing of the cause (vii. 50), and again, after 
the crucifixion, in connection with Joseph of Arimathea, as 
an applicant for His body, for which he had brought a rich 
supply of “ myrrh and aloes ” (xix. 38). 

After this sojourn in Jerusalem, Jesus and His Disciples 
are once more, for a while, in the neighborhood of John the 
Baptist and his company, who were at {non near Salim, 
which appears to have been within the bounds of Judea." 
This gives the Evangelist occasion to mention a dispute 
between some of John’s disciples and a Jew—the plural 
(Jews) is an erroneous reading—about baptism ; probably, 
upon the comparative significance and value of the rite as 
performed by John and by Jesus. This rite was kept up 
by Jesus, and became a permanent institution in the 
Church ; although, as the Evangelist takes care to inform 
us, it was the Disciples, and not Jesus Himself, the Head 


1 566 John iv. 3. This passage does not favor the opinion that Anon 
was near Scythopolis, as is held by Prof. Hackett (Bible Dict., Am. ed., 
Art. _Afnon), and others. 


436 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY 


of the kingdom, who administered it. The jealousy of 
certain disciples of the Baptist, failed to affect John him- 
self, who. compared himself to the friend of the Bridegroom, 
who rejoices to hear the Bridegroom’s voice and to give 
place to him. ? 

The announcement that the Pharisees were informed of 
the increasing number of His disciples, moved Jesus to 
leave Judea and return to Galilee, where He would be 
farther removed from their machinations. On the way, at 
Sichem, occured the memorable interview with the Woman 
of Samaria; and, on the same journey, the visit of the 
“nobleman,” a person in the civil or military service of 
Herod Antipas, whose son was sick at Capernaum. The 
miracle of healing, not to be confounded, it would seem, 
with the healing of the Centurion’s son,* is said to be 
“the second miracle that Jesus did, when He was come 
out of Judea into Galilee ;”* that is to say, it marked His 
second entrance into Galilee, as the miracle at Cana had 
marked His first. 

John does not state when the Baptist was thrown into 
prison. He simply explains that up to a certain point 
in his narrative this event had not taken place. To 
identify either of the journeys into Galilee which John 
describes with that journey, which, according to the first 
three Evangelists, followed the confinement of John and 
preceded the Galilean ministry, leaves certain chronologi- 
cal difficulties unsolved. As concerns the opening pages 
of the Synoptists, we must be content with the vivid and 
truthful picture which they present of the early labors 
of Jesus in Capernaum and the adjacent region. It is 
impossible to fix with certainty the chronological place 
of so interesting an incident as the preaching of Jesus, 


1John iv. 2. ?John iii. 29.  *®Matt. viii. 5-14, Luke vii. 1-11. 
* John iy. 54. 


MINISTRY OF JESUS. 437 


and His rejection, at Nazareth, which is set down by 
Luke at the very beginning of the Galilean ministry, but 
which is put elsewhere by Matthew and Mark.’ Turning 
to Mark, we find a graphic account, such as the Kvan- 
gelist might well have derived from Peter, of the power- 
ful impression made by Jesus at the outset of His work 
in that region. It began with teaching, and with the 
calling of Disciples.? He preached the Good News of 
the Kingdom—that the period of time preceding had now 
run out ; and He called upon the people to repent and to 
believe in this Gospel. The Evangelist gives us a sketch 
of a single day in His life.* On a Saturday—a Jewish 
Sabbath—He entered into a synagogue of Capernaum, and 
taught. No such teaching had been heard from the 
Scribes ; He spoke from a living intuition of truth, which 
required no nice argumentation or appeals to tradition in 
support of it; He spoke “as one that had authority,” * 
and a profound impression was made by His words. In 
the synagogue was a demoniac; a lunatic with that dual 
consciousness, which sprang out of a real or supposed posses- 
sion by an evil spirit. The outcries of this maniac were 
stilled at the command of Jesus. His shrieks and convul- 
sions were immediately followed, to the amazement of the 
spectators, by a restoration to his right mind. Coming out 
of the synagogue, Jesus entered the house of Simon Peter, the 
mother of whose wife was confined to her bed with a fever. 
On being told of her illness, He went to her, and took her 
by the hand, when she rose up, cured of her disorder, and 
able to prepare the meal for the household. At sunset, 
when the Sabbath had closed, there was a great gathering 
at the door. Demoniacs, and persons afflicted with all sorts 
of disorders, were brought thither by their friends, that He 


1 Luke iv. 14-30, Matt. xiii. 53-58, Mark vi. 1-6. 
? Mark i. 14 seq. > Mark i. 21 seq. “Mark i. 22. 


438 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


might heal them. ‘This work of mercy and power closed 
the day. On the following morning, long before the dawn, 
He rose from His bed, and went out of the town to a seclu- 
ded place for prayer. There, at a later hour, Peter and 
his associates found Him. So, in all the towns of Galilee, 
as the Evangelists tell us, He taught, proclaiming the near 
presence of the Kingdom, and healing those afflicted with 
disease. 

A sketch of the beginning of the ministry of Jesus may 
properly close with a notice of the death of John the Bap- 
tist. When John crossed the Jordan, he came into the 
country of Herod Antipas, who, by the last change in the 
will of his father, Herod “the Great,” was Tetrarch of 
Galilee and Perea. This Prince had the cruelty, the cun- 
ning, and the sensuality, but lacked the energetic virtues, 
of his father. While on a visit to Rome, he became enam- 
ored of Herodias, the wife of his half-brother, Herod 
Philip I. She was herself the daughter of Aristobulus, 
one of the sons of Herod the Great, so that Herod Anti- 
pas, whom she deserted her husband to marry, was her 
step-uncle. To effect this adulterous and incestuous union, 
Herod Antipas was obliged to separate from his wife, 
who was a daughter of Aretas, the Emir of Arabia, and 
who fled from his household to her father. His marriage 
with Herodias brought upon him the calamities of his 
reign. Aretas, indignant at the repudiation of his daugh- 
ter—there was also a dispute concerning boundaries— 
made war upon him, and inflicted upon him a crushing 
defeat. At a later day, at the instigation of Herodias, he 
repaired to Rome to obtain from Caligula the title of king ; 
but he was opposed by the agents of Herod Agrippa, was 
banished to Lugdunum, and ended his life in exile. 

What was the ground of the arrest of John? Josephus 


* Mark i. 39. 


JOHN’S IMPRISONMENT, 439 


says that, seeing the crowds that flocked after him, Herod 
apprehended a rebellion, which a leader of so great influ- 
ence could easily excite, and determined to forestall the 
danger by taking the life of the prophet.! The Evange- 
lists attribute the seizure and death of John to his bold re- 
buke of Herod on account of his marriage to Herodias, and 
to herenmity. . These two grounds are quite consistent with 
each other. That John should condemn Herod, in his 
public discourses, and even privately to his face, was en- 
tirely in keeping with the character of the Prophet, with 
the denunciations that he uttered to the Pharisees, and with 
the Old Testament examples of the courage and faithful- 
ness of such men as Samuel and Elijah, in dealing with 
iniquitous princes. Luke states that John rebuked Herod, 
not only for marrying his brother’s wife, but also ‘for all 
the evils” which he had done? This being the attitude 
of the Prophet, the fear of a rebellion on the side of Herod, 
and the mortal hatred of Herodias, might well co-exist, and 
conspire to effect the destruction of John. He was cast into 
the Castle of Macherus,’ situated eastward from the Jordan, 
and at once a splendid palace and an impregnable fortifi- 
cation. Matthew says that Herod desired to put him to 
death, but feared that the popularity of the Prophet might 
lead to the avenging of his death. Mark says that Herod 
“feared John,” knowing that he was a just and holy man; 
that the King (as he was called by courtesy ὅ) frequently had 
interviews with him, listened to him, and in many things 
followed the directions of John:* so that when Salome, 
obeying the instruction of her mother, Herodias, demanded 
the Prophet’s head, Herod was extremely sorry. But 
Matthew, also, says that Herod was sorry (ἐλυπήϑη), when 
this bloody forfeit was exacted ;7 and Matthew states that 
1 Antiq. xviii. 5, 2. * Luke iii. 19. 3 Antiq. xviii. 5, 3. 
* Matt. xiv. 5. 5 Mark vi. 25. ὁ Mark vi. 20. T Matt. xiv. 9. 


440 ᾿ς THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


when the fame of Jesus and of His miracles in Galilee, 
reached the ears of the tyrant, he exclaimed: “ this is John 
the Baptist; he is risen from the dead!” * Such an excla- 
mation could spring only from a terrified conscience. That 
he had a divided mind with reference to the murder of 
John, is probable. Anger at the Prophet’s rebuke of his 
crime, and dread of a popular rising, had urged him to the 
deed. At the same time, a secret homage for so holy a 
man, which he could not extinguish in his mind, and, in 
certain moods, a disposition to hear him, and to obey his 
counsels—a kind of fascination which the Prophet cast over 
him at moments when a sense of guilt was awakened—held 
him back from so dreadful a crime. The pledge to Hero- 
dias which, in the presence of all his guests at the festival, 
he was called upon to redeem, compelled him toa decision. 

The disciples of John took up his corpse, which was, 
perhaps, thrown outside the wall of the fortress, and buried 
it; and “ went and told Jesus.” 5 Herod’s attention was 
called to what Jesus was doing, apparently shortly after 
the murder of John, and while the twelve disciples of Jesus 
were on the mission upon which He had sent them.* On 
being informed of these circumstances by the Apostles on 
their return, Jesus who was on the Galilean side of the 
Lake, crossed to some retired place near Bethsaida, lying 
on the north-east of the Lake, in the dominion of another 
prince, the Tetrarch Philip. The grand figure of John the 
Baptist disappears from the history, eclipsed only by One 
immeasurably Greater, of whom John had said: “He must 
increase, but I must decrease!” * 


1 xiv. 2. 2 Matt. xiv. 12. 3 Luke ix. 1seq. ‘* John ii’. 30. 


THE PLAN OF JESUS, 441 


CHAPTER XIV. 
THE PLAN OF JESUS AND HIS MEANS OF ACCOMPLISHING IT. 


Ir is clear that from the outset of His public ministry, 
Jesus presented Himself to His Disciples as the Christ— 
the predicted Messiah of the Old Testament. His reserve 
and caution in proclaiming Himself in this character are 
not difficult of explanation. They do not militate against 
the statement above made, but rather serve to confirm the 
truth of it.. It has been pretended by some that, whatever 
may have been His own conviction on this point, the A pos- 
tles at least were not at first instructed as to the real nature 
of the office which He was to assume, but regarded Him as 
a prophet, with no defined view as to His particular func- 
tion and rank. This theory is supposed to be sustained by 
a conversation of Jesus with the Disciples (Matt. xvi. 13 seq.) 
at a time when they had long been associated with Him. 
“ Whom do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?” Thean- 
swer was that by some He was taken for John the Baptist, 
risen from the dead—which was also the conjecture of Her- 
od Antipas, under the prompting of a frightened conscience : 
by others He was thought to be Elijah, who was expected 
to re-appear as the immediate precursor of the Messiah; by 
others still He was supposed to be Jeremiah, or some other 
great prophet, returning to the earth to discharge a similar 
office. Having heard their report of the opinions enter- 
tained by others, Jesus turns to them with the inquiry: 
“But whom say ye that I am?” In response to Peter’s 


442 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


exclamation: “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living 
God,” Jesus pronounced his confession of Faith, or him as 
making this confession, the rock on which the Church was 
to be built. It contained the substance of the Christian 
faith. This conversation is far from implying that Peter 
and his fellow-disciples now for the first time recog: 
nised their Master as the Christ, as if they had been 
previously ignorant or doubtful on this point. The 
same Evangelist who records it, affords full proof to 
the contrary. In the Sermon on the Mount, the date of 
which is fixed by the contemporaneous selection of the 
Disciples, Jesus presents Himself in the most unmistakable 
manner as the Messiah. In the conference with the mes- 
sengers who had been sent by the Baptist, Jesus sends 
back to the prophet, who for the moment was wavering in 
his faith, an enumeration of the works done by Himself, all 
of them the well understood proofs and badges of the 
Messiah (Matt. xi. 4 seq.). The same Evangelist records 
(xi. 25 seq.) the thanksgiving of Jesus that not the wise 
and prudent, but the humble and ignorant, had been 
brought to discern the things of the Gospel; and this ex- 
pression He accompanied by a declaration respecting his 
relation to the Father, such as a prophet lower than the 
Christ could never make: “ All things are delivered unto 
me of my Father, and no man knoweth the Son but the 
Father; neither knoweth any man the Father save the 
Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him.” He 
was styled the Son ot God by the demoniacs (Matt. viii. 
29), and, on another occasion, by those who witnessed His 
miraculous power on the Sea of Galilee (Matt. xiv. 33). * 
At the very beginning, he was recognized in this character 


1 Among other passages in Matthew which distinctly involve a pro- 
fession of Messiahship on the part of Jesus, see viii. 21, ix. 1-8, x. 32, 
xii. 1-9. 


JESUS A KING. 443 


by John the Baptist, as the Synoptical Gospels imply ; and 
through this testimony, according to the Evangelist John 
(i. 42, 46, 50), the first disciples were led to attach them- 
selves to Him. The emphatic commendation of Peter, in 
the passage to which we have referred (Matt. xvi. 13 seq.), 
was not for the reason that he, for the first time, and in 
advance of the other Apostles, had discovered that Jesus 
was no other than the Christ. But it was the extraordinary 
circumstances under which Peter’s faith was declared, 
and its peculiar character, which elicited the reply of 
Jesus. The people were hesitating and doubting on ac- 
count of the disappointment of their expectations: Jesus 
showed no sign of appearing as a political champion. At 
this moment, Peter broke out in the most fervent profes- 
sion of his faith. Moreover, it was a belief which “ flesh 
and blood”—human testimony—had not evoked within 
him. It was the outpouring of an inner, irresistible con- 
viction ; it was a revelation from above. A believer when 
others were doubtful, speaking from an illumination of 
mind which God Himself had imparted, the ardent A postie 
merited the distinction of being called the Rock. There 
is nothing in this incident which is inconsistent with what 
we know from other sources, that Jesus from the day of 
His baptism professed Himself to be the Messiah, and was 
owned as such by His followers.’ 

From His first public appearance, Jesus represented 
Himself as the founder and head of a kingdom. The 
“kingdom of God”—“the kingdom of heaven ”—was 
what He came to establish. This claim and design per- 
vade the Gospel narrative of His teachings. The inscrip- 
tion upon the cross—This is the King of the Jews—meant 
as a sarcasm, set forth the office which all knew that He 


1 That Jesus was assured of His Messiahship from the beginning of 
His ministry, is admitted and maintained by Keim, Gesch. Jesu, i. 543. 


444 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY, 


claimed to fill. But the whole tenor of His life and of His 
declarations proved that this kingdom, or community, was 
to be bound together by a moral and spiritual bond of 
union. Its members were to be united by an inward af- 
finity, and a common spirit of love to Him. It was to be 
a fraternity of souls. Another thing that is evident in 
His teaching is that the Gentiles were to belong to this 
kingdom. It was not for the posterity of Abraham alone. 
This is perfectly clear from much of the teaching of Christ, 
as recorded in Matthew, not to speak of the other Gospels." 
That He first sent out the twelve “to the lost sheep of the 
house of Israel,’? and His reply to the Syrophcenician 
woman,* indicate only the limit set to His own personal 
labors in founding the kingdom. But even in this last 
place, His compliance with the earnest request of the 
woman, shows that this limit was no impassable barrier, 
but was only temporary,—a preliminary step towards the 
execution of a more comprehensive plan.* His interview 
with the woman of Samaria, and the incidents that fol- 
lowed, are a similar proof that it was a large expediency, 
and not a rigid or exclusive spirit, that confined His own 
labors mainly to the Jewish people. 

But all this may be conceded, and yet it might be sup- 
posed that Jesus looked forward to the organization of this 
community in a political form. This idea has been seri- 
ously advocated by certain writers. They have supposed 
that Jesus may have anticipated such an acceptance of His 
authority on the part of the people as would lead, through 
a peaceful revolution, to His enthronement in the seat of 
David. And as to the inclusion of the Gentiles—that 
was a familiar feature of Old Testament prophecy, and 

1 See below, p. 470. 2 Matt. x. 6. 3 Matt. xv. 27, Mark vii. 28. 


4 Against the notion that the plan of Jesus had a “ national-particu- 
laristische Beschriinkung,” see Baur, Ν. 1. Theologie, p. 118 seq. 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 445 


must have been expected in some form, even by those 
who conceived of the Messiah as a temporal prince. 
Bishop Butler, in an interesting passage of the Analogy, 
descanting upon the tendency of virtue to acquire power, 
‘imagines a kingdom or society of persons, perfectly vir- 
tuous, for a succession of ages. He depicts the inward 
unity and strength of such a community, and the advan- 
tages which it would possess, not only for repelling injuries, 
but for extending its sway through a moral influence. “It 
would plainly be superior to all others, and the world must 
gradually come under its empire: not by means of lawless 
violence, but partly by what must be allowed to be a just 
conquest ; and partly by the kingdoms submitting them- 
selves voluntarily to it, throughout a course of ages, and 
claiming its protection, one after another, in successive exi- 
gencies.””' One who imputes to Jesus the limitations of 
knowledge and foresight that pertain to men generally, may 
conceive of Him, in the earlier stages of His career, as 
having indulged a noble but fallacious hope of this nature 
—a hope shattered and dissipated by the bitter experience 
of the world’s hatred to righteousness. Were this a correct 
theory, we should be obliged to suppose that, having started 
with high and enthusiastic hopes of being the instrument 
of the moral and spiritual renovation of the Jewish nation, 
and of the wide extension of the kingdom, in accordance 
with the prophetic anticipations, He was brought finally to 
the necessity of abandoning these glowing expectations, and 
of giving to His undertaking another cast. Plausible as 
such a theory may sound, it will not stand the test of his- 
torical investigation. In the conception of Jesus that un- 
derlies it, there is overlooked that sobriety of His mental 
tone, and that knowledge of human nature, which saved 
Him at all times from illusive hopes, and enabled Him to 


1 Analogy, ch. iii. 


446 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


forecast the future. An attentive examination of the Gos- 
pel history will show the falsity of the hypothesis which 
attributes to the founder of Christianity the design to esta- 
blish a temporal kingdom of however exalted a type. 

1. At the threshold of the narrative of the public life of 
Jesus stands the account of the Temptation. Whatever 
may be the proper interpretation of the passage, wherever 
the line may be drawn between the literal and the figura- 
tive in its contents, it is hardly reasonable to doubt, from 
its chronological position, that it describes inward experi- 
ences of Jesus at the crisis when He was about to enter 
upon His public work. It was the hour of preparation; 
the future lay before Him. What course should He pur- 
sue? How should He use the miraculous powers with 
which He was endowed? We have, in this narrative, the 
suggestions that passed through His mind, only to be in- 
stantly repelled. There are also reflected in this narrative the 
temptations that lay in His path through the whole course if 
His life. It is an epitome of those demands, solicitations, 
worldly hopes and aspirations, which it was His moral task 
to withstand, even though the consequence of His fidelity to 
a loftier ideal were the sacrifice of His life. Jesus was not ex- 
empt from that law of divine Providence in virtue of which 
extraordinary powers bring with them a proportionate moral 
trial. Shall they be used—these high and exceptional powers 
— for the end for which they are given, in subservience to the 
divine order ; or shall they be wielded as a private instru- 
ment, for the furtherance of some personal end? Shall they, 
even if not thus perverted, be employed after a method not 
authorized by Him who bestowed them? If we follow the 
order in Matthew, which is marked by profound psycho- 
logical verity, the first temptation was to use that extra- 
ordinary power over physical nature, of which Jesus 
found Himself possessed, for the gratification of His per- 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 447 


sonal wants—the alternative being an unfaltering trust in 
God, who would see that these necessities were, in His own 
time and way, supplied. When this solicitation had been re- 
pelled, the appeal was artfully made to that very trust in 
God which had been His panoply against this first assault 
of evil. Being thus protected by God, why should He not 
demonstrate His privilege by flinging Himself needlessly 
into danger? Why not leap from the pinnacle of the tem- 
ple? Shall this miraculous power be regarded as a sacred 
deposit, to be used only inconformity with the design for 
which it was imparted, or shall it be the medium of a daz- 
zling spectacle—something akin to the arts of magic—a 
vain self-glorification? It is in the last of the temptations 
that the unworldly character of the kingdom which Jesus 
was aiming to establish, becomes manifest. A hasty 
outward success, a rapid progress of His cause through 
methods not accordant with the divine plan and will, 
and involving, under however fair a disguise, a com- 
pliance with a Satanic spirit of self-assertion and of 
opposition to God, was recommended to Him, and pressed 
upon Him from without, at every stage of His career. 
When Peter uttered his warm remonstrance against the 
idea that his Master was to suffer and be put to death, 
Jesus treated it as a suggestion of evil, an effort of the 
Tempter and Adversary to decoy Him out of the ap- 
pointed path, and impel Him to a course, which though it 
might promise a speedy, imposing triumph, involved the 
surrender of His supreme allegiance to right and truth. 
Kindred suggestions emanating from friends, relatives, 
and loved disciples, or coming as taunts of His enemies, 
met Him at every turn. But He gave to them no shadow 
of countenance. 

Jesus exhibited an entire independence of parties. 
His position was not determined by any feeling of opposi- 


448 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


tion to any of them; He represented no reaction. Rather 
is it true that He stood on a higher plane, and was moved 
by considerations altogether distinct from any impulse to 
follow or to oppose prevailing tenets. ‘This is remarkable 
especially as regards the Pharisees, to whom He conceded 
a certain authority as teachers of the law, and who from 
their number, and standing, and apparent sanctity, im- 
pressed the people with awe. Jesus discriminates between 
what is to be followed and what rejected in their creed and 
conduct. But nothing in the plan of His own career, or 
in the doctrine which He inculcated, is caught up from 
them. His path is marked out with entire independence, 
in a way to clash directly with the ideas of the most re- 
vered leaders. This is one of the most impressive evidences 
of the originality of Jesus. It was from within, and not 
from without that He derived that conception of His office 
and work, which, with undeviating constancy, He proceeded 
to realize. 

2. On every occasion when he was invited to exercise 
functions which belong to a temporal kingship, he declined 
to do so, and disavowed the possession of the prerogatives 
which acts of this nature would involve. When asked 
whether it was lawful to give tribute unto Cesar—a ques- 
tion proposed for the purpose of eliciting some profession 
of authority of a civil nature—he replied by directing that 
the coin which was paid in tribute should go to the person 
whose image it bore. When asked to adjudicate a ques- 
tion of disputed inheritance, he disowned the functions of 
‘‘a judge and divider.” His mission was to eradicate cove- 
tousness.” He reminded Pilate that the fact that His disciples 
did not fight proved His kingdom not to be of this world? 
How could a kingdom exist without the exertion of physi- 


1 Matt. xxii. 17, Mark xii. 14, Luke xx. 22. 
3 Luke xii. 13. 3 John xvii. 36, 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 449 


eal power? When the enthusiastic peopie would make Him 
a king, He “departed into a mountain Himself alone.” 

3. The nature of the regal office which Jesus assumed 
is clearly enough seen in His actual proceedings. 

What was the character of His legislation? This appears 
in the precepts of the Sermon on the Mount. They relate 
to tempers of heart as between man and man, and man 
and God, and to ethical conduct. They have nothing directly 
to do with civil relations and obligations. They are 
stripped of all sense and of all value, unless it is presup- 
posed that the Lawgiver has in view, not the organization 
of a state, but the moral guidance of mankind. Nothing 
can be further from a scheme of civil polity than the in- 
junctions of Jesus in this discourse and elsewhere.’ 

Who are to be the subjects of the new kingdom? They 
are those who become as little children.* They who pur- 
pose in their hearts to do the will of the Heavenly Father 
belong to the kingdom.* Such a parable as that of the 
Unforgiving Debtor® shows what the qualifications are of 
those who are enrolled as subjects of Christ. 

The exertions of power which Christ put forth illustrate 
the character of His kingship. ‘They were directed to the 


1 John vi. 15. 

2 Professor Holtzmann, who is not to be classed with conservative 
critics, forcibly sets forth the inconsistency of the Sermon on the Mount 
with the supposition of any illusion in its Author respecting the effect 
of His work: “Steht es aber so mit der Bergrede, so liefert schon sie 
Beweis genug hierfiir, das Jesus von Anfang an ein Kreuzesreich vor 
Augen sah, und dass er sich nie der Illusion hingegeben hat, eine 
weltliche Reform oder auch nur einen allgemeinen religiés-sittlichen 
Umschwung im Volke Israel gleichsam wie mit einem Zauberstabe her- 
vorrufen zu kénnen. Eine Theokratie mitten im rémischen Reich 
griinden zu wollen, wiire die Sache eines Schwarmenden gewesen.” Dve 
Synopt. Evangg., pp. 481, 482. 

3 Matt. xviii. 3, xix. 14, Mark x. 14, Luke xviii. 16. 

‘ or 21, xii. 50. 5 Matt. xvii. 23-35. 


450 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


extirpation of sin and of its consequences. He healed the 
sick, restored lunatics to the use of reason, asserted his 
dominion over Nature by subduing the tempest, and mul- 
tiplying the loaves for the feeding of the hungry.? 

The penalty of unfaithfulness to his commandments was 
expulsion from the fellowship and companionship of his 
followers. But the tares were to be left to grow with the 
wheat. The punishment of disobedience was to be in- 
flicted, not through the verdict of any visible earthly tri- 
bunal, but by a Judgment which stands at the termination 
of the present order of things. 

4, The character of the persons whom He brought into 
close connection with Himself, and made His special agents, 
is enough to show that He looked forward to no civil revo- 
lution by which a new form of government should be set 
up in the Jewish state. He described them Himself 
as ‘‘ babes” *—men of childlike simplicity of character, 
strangers to all the arts and accomplishments requisite for 
y the realization of political schemes. All but one of them 
were Galileans. Had Jesus aimed to effect His end, either 
through scientific thought, or worldly sagacity and power, 
He would have selected a very different class of instru- 
ments. And to suppose that He hoped to found a new 
civil community of an utterly exceptional character— 
resting solely on consent, and voluntary obedience to the 
behests of right—is to impute to Him an idea more vision- 
ary by far than ever entered the brain of a philosophic 
dreamer. 

5. These erroneous judgments as to the plan of Jesus 
are precluded by observing the clearness with which He 
discerned the obstacles that stood in the way of the ac- 


1 On this topic there are fine remarks by Ewald, Geschichte d. V. Israel, 
v. 189. 
2 Matt. xi. 25, Luke x. 21. 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 451 


ceptance of His claims and of His doctrine. There is no 
ground whatever for thinking that He ever for a moment 
expected an easy triumph and a universal rally to His 
cause. No delusion was possible on this point. From the 
first, He warned His followers that they must look for per- 
secution.! From the rulers of Church and State, even 
from their own household, they must expect opposition 
carried to the pitch of bitter hatred. ὅ 

6. In connection with the mention of this perception, on 
His part, of the enmity which the band of His disciples 
would provoke upon themselves, observe the insight into 
the general effect of His teaching on different classes of 
men, which characterized Him. He knew what was in 
man. He understood the power of sin in human nature, 
and the resistance to be expected from this antagonistic 
principle. One who has derived from the study of the 
Gospels anything like an adequate sense of the profound 
moral discernment of Jesus will find it impossible to believe 
that He counted upon an easy victory, that He undervalued 
the depth of human blindness, and the strength of human 
selfishness. Rather is it true that He weighed this resist- 
ing force exactly. He directed His glance forward, and 
foresaw what would be the reception of the Gospel among 
the generations of men. Nothing can be farther removed 
from the temper of an enthusiast or a visionary, than the 
calm survey which He presents of the reception which will 
be accorded to His doctrine—for example, in the Parable 
of the Sower.? He who knew how, by a word, to probe 
the heart and bring out its hidden secret, or bring to the 
light its dominant passion, was not ignorant of the obstacles 
which must be overcome in order to give success to His 
mission. 


? Matt. v. 11, 12, x. 16-22, 98. ? Matt. x. 35, 36, Luke xiv. 26. 
* Matt. xiii. 3 seq., Mark iy. 3seq., Luke viii. 5 seq. 


452 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


7. He anticipated, from the beginning, that His life 
would be the forfeit of His fidelity to the work that had 
been given Him to do. It was natural that He should not 
at the outset, but, rather, later and by degrees, convey to 
His disciples the knowledge of an event which ran counter 
to their pre-established ideas, and which it was hard for 
them to conceive of as possible. It was natural, too, that 
a more joyous tone should mingle in the first proclamation 
of the good tidings, before the gathering enmity of priest 
and scribe, with its deadly intent, had been developed. 
As the event drew near, the shadow which it cast before 
grew darker, the expectation of it more vivid, the predic- 
tion of it more distinct. But that Jesus looked forward 
to it as the only possible issue of the inevitable conflict 
which He waged with the ruling powers, admits of no rea- 
sonable doubt. 

8. If any temporal or political elements, however subli- 
mated in their character, had mingled in the conception 
which Jesus cherished of His kingship, the fact would 
have been manifest in the preaching and in the writings 
of the Apostles. They knew what was the character of 
the Master’s teaching. They make it evident, by the course 
which they themselves pursued, that the kingdom of Jesus, 
although it was to transform and mould every human in- 
stitution by its influence, had nothing to do directly with 
any earthly polity. 

That Jesus wore the title of king need occasion no sur- 
prise. Among the Jews, the kingdom, from the outset, 
was a theocracy. When a human king was appointed, He 
‘was king but in a secondary sense, as the deputy of the 
Invisible King, and the inspired depositary of His will.” Ὁ 
It was God Himself who had called the nation, elected it to 
be His people; and it was He who had given its laws, 


1Ecce Homo, ch. iv. 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 453 


Royalty, therefore, had a deeper and higher meaning to 
the Jewish mind, than it bears in modern days. There 
was room for a wider, a spiritual conception. Christ was 
king, as He “claimed the character first of Founder, next 
of Legislator, thirdly, in a certain high and peculiar sense, 
of Judge, of a new divine society.” ὦ 

When we review the New Testament history, it becomes 
clear that the kingdom which Jesus essayed to found was 
to have its seat in the hearts of men. To the question of 
the Pharisees when the kingdom of God should come, He 
answered that the kingdom of God cometh not with ob- 
servation ;7 it was not something visible, a spectacle for 
men to behold, and whose beginning could thus be pre- 
cisely marked. “ Behold,” He added, “the kingdom of 
God is within you,” or, as it should be rendered, “ in the 
midst of you.” * He in whom the kingdom had its origin 
stood with them ; and the life of loyalty to God, the char- 
acteristic of the kingdom, was in Him and in the souls of 
the faithful men whom He had drawn into fellowship with 
His own spirit. When ambitious followers, or their rela- 
tions for them, petitioned for places of honor near His 
throne, He replied that the chief rank in His Kingdom 
belonged to him who was most devoted to serving others, 
even as He had come not to be ministered unto, but to 
minister.* 

Particular passages in which the kingdom is described in 
symbols drawn from the characteristics of the old dispensa- 
tion are not tov be construed with a prosaic literalness, but 
in harmony with the general drift. and purport of the teach- 
ing of Jesus on the subject. He was to drink wine new 
with His disciples in the kingdom of His Father (Matt. 
xxvi. 29; Mark xiv. 25; Luke xxii. 18); a figurative rep- 

1 Lbid. p. 36 (Boston, 1866). ? Luke xvii. 20. 3 Verse 2]. 

* Matt. xx. 20-28, Mark x. 35-45. 


454 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


resentation of the joys of that society which was to exist 
when the kingdom should appear in its consummated form. 
They were to sit with Him on thrones, judging the twelve 
tribes of Israel (Matt. xix. 28 ; Luke xxii. 30) ; a mode of 
setting forth the share in His blessedness and glory, which 
everywhere in the New Testament is described as the des- 
tiny of His followers. Those who would unwarrantably 
press the language of these declarations, as if countenance 
were given in them to the ideas of a carnal Judaism, fail to 
remember the tropical style which is one of the obvious 
characteristics of the teaching of Jesus.‘ On the last night, 
having referred to+the time when He had sent them out 
without purse, and scrip, and shoes, and yet they had lacked 
nothing, He told them to take purse and scrip, and bade 
each of them to buy a sword, even if he had to sell his gar- 
ment to get the means of doing so (Luke xxii. 35, 36)- 
In this vivid way, He contrasted the peril that was now 
coming upon them with a past day of comparative security. 
No one imagines that He meant the injunction to be taken 
literally, meant them to take up arms against their enemies. 
Yet at the moment they failed to apprehend His meaning; 
and He chose to turn from the subject, with the words— 
referring to the two swords which they said they had—‘“ it 
is enough!” In describing the kingdom of which He was 
the founder and head, it was inevitable that He should draw 
upon the imagery of the Old Testament. In no other way 
than by these pictures could the Disciples be taught, imbued 
as they were with the prevalent conception which gave a 
predominantly material character to the Messianic reign. 
It was not by wholly discarding the figurative and poetic 
delineations of the kingdom that the truth involved in them 


1 Baur takes a sound view of these passages, regarding them as figura- 
tive. See his Ν. 7. Theologie, p. 112. 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 455 


was to be conveyed into minds on which abstract. state- 
ments would fail to make a living impression. 

Jesus, in repeated instances, bade those for whose benefit 
He exerted His healing power, be silent respecting the mi- 
racleand its Author.’ In the early part of His ministry, 
especially, He guarded against any public proclamation of 
Himself as the Christ, and was willing to leave the multitude 
in doubt as to His precise mission and office.” Notoriety 
was ungrateful to Him. The motives of this procedure 
on His part it is not difficult to divine; and they cor- 
roborate the view which we have presented of His plan 
and aims. The throng, eager for the realization of the 
hopes of Israel, were impatient of delay. They looked 
to see the Messiah sit in visible glory on the throne of 
David, a terror to all their enemies. They would even 
take Him by force and make Him a king (John vi. 15). 
This popular aspiration He could not meet: He must do 
what He can to elevate and purify it. It was not hard to 
draw after Him a host of zealous adherents. He took all 
pains to thin the ranks of those who followed Him (John 
vi. 66), by acquainting them with the delusive character of 
their ideas concerning Him. He was not to give victory 
and glory to the theocracy ; He was to suffer, and to die 
on the cross. Moreover, He must guard against precipi- 
tating the conflict with the ruling class, which He well 
knew could have only one issue, and must gain time to 
train His Disciples, and to plant in the world the seed of 
divine truth. Hence the prudence which He showed in 
withholding the full disclosure of His own claims, in avoid- 
ing needless publicity, and in postponing the inevitable con- 
flict, which was a consequence of His teaching and His 
works, until He should have time to lay the foundations, 
firm and broad, of His spiritual kingdom. 

τ Matt. viii. 4, Mark viii. 26,30, Lukev. 14, viii. 56, Mark vii. 36. 

2 Luke ix. 21, Mark ix. 9, Matt. xvii. 9. 


456 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


But Jesus was consciously more than the founder of a 
spiritual society to be attracted out of the world of mankind 
which had become estranged from communion with God, by 
the force of His personal influence, and to have its life in 
Him. His kingdom was to act upon the world, and to bring 
the world under its sway. His Disciples were the “ salt 
of the earth,” the “light of the world,” “a city set ona 
hill,” a candle not hidden from sight, but set in a candle- 
stick to shed light all around it. His kingdom was to spread 
outwardly, and also to leaven human society with its spirit, 
until the whole world should be created anew by its agency. ? 
The consummation of this beneficial conquest, to be sure, 
was to be reached in connection with a final manifestation 
of Himself, which is described throughout the New Testa- 
ment as the Parusia (παρουσία), or Advent, when the sift- 
ing and separating operation incident to the Gospel in all 
the course of history reaches its climax. The twofold 
character of the kingdom, first as a transformation of the 
individual, and then as a world-conquering and world- 
purifying influence, is involved in all the teaching of 
Jesus, and formed the essential characteristic of His plan. 


When we inquire for the means on which Jesus relied 
for the accomplishment of a revolution, the grandest which 
it ever entered into the heart of man to conceive—it 
being nothing less than the moral regeneration of man- 
kind,—we find them to be in harmony with the elevated 
character of His aims. There is no occult policy. There 
is no elaborate contrivance of machinery. Everything is 
simple and as open as the day. The first of these means 
was teaching. Looking at His method or style, we find 
that not a little of His teaching was in gnomes, or brief, 
pointed sentences, easy to be remembered. This was a 


1 Matt. vy. 13-17. 2 Matt. xiii. 31-33, Mark xiii. 18-22. 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 457 


method of conveying instruction which was in vogue 
among Rabbinical teachers. In the hands of Jesus it was 
made an instrument of unexampled potency. As the truth 
which He uttered was deeper, so the aphorism in which it 
was embodied was the more weighty. The use of para- 
bles was not something absolutely new. It had examples 
in the Old Testament and among the Rabbis. The im- 
mediate motive for the employment of this means of 
conveying knowledge was the advantage afforded by it 
for a lucid and vivid exhibition of the truth. In these 
narratives, as in pictures, the abstract reality was made 
to stand forth in a concrete form. Doctrine, precept, 
and argument were all incorporated in them in a way 
that could hardly be gainsaid. What reasoning could bet- 
ter justify, what eloquence could more impressively set 
forth, the compassion of God to sinful men than the story 
of the Prodigal Son? How could the narrowness which 
confines charity and kindly feeling to the limits of class and 
sect, be more effectually rebuked than in the tale of the 
Good Samaritan? How is the contrast of self-esteem and 
humility depicted in the story of the Pharisee and the Pub- 
lican? There was another consequence connected with the 
method of teaching by parables. On the ear of those who 
were destitute of sympathy with the Teacher and His doc- 
trine, and therefore lacked both curiosity and insight, they 
produced no effect. They awakened no desire to get at 
the truth that was wrapt up in them. On the contrary, 
those who felt the attraction of the Teacher, and wished to 
see clearly that of which they had gained a partial glimpse, 
could tarry and receive the enlightenment which they 
craved.’ That others besides the Twelve took this way of 
gaining light, the Evangelists explicitly inform us. In 
this way, the parables served as the occasion for that sepa- 


1 Mark iy. 34. 


458 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


ration between those who were susceptible to the influence 
of the truth, and those who were indifferent, or steeled 
against it. The latter class, hearing what they could not 
comprehend, and did not care to explore, went away as they 
came. Thus the Gospel had a judicial effect, dividing one 
from another, and proving itself to be a touchstone of char- 
acter.’ 

It would be very strange if the teaching of Jesus had 
been confined entirely to the utterance of aphorisms and 
parables. ΑἹ] that is fairly meant by the statement in 
Matthew, that He spoke continually in parables (xiii. 34), is 
that they formed the staple of His popular discourses. The 
same Evangelist records the Sermon on the Mount. It is 
expressly said that in private converse with His Disciples, 
He expounded the parables to them (Mark iv. 34). And 
it is clear even from the Synoptical Gospels that in the 
company of His intimate followers, and sometimes else- 
where, Headopted the manner of continuous discourse, apart 
from parabolic illustration. That He should at times have 
taught in a style of consecutive address, as the Fourth 
Gospel describes, is surely what would be anticipated, and 
can properly occasion no surprise. 

That Jesus adapted His communications, in both form 
and matter, to the mental and moral condition of His hear- 
ers, is made evident. The full blaze of truth would not 
have enlightened, but have dazzled and misled, those who 
were not prepared, by previous training, to recognize it. 
The minds of men, even of the Apostles, must by degrees 
be educated up to the apprehension of truth, which 
clashed in many of its features with their traditional ideas. 
Jesus compared Himself to a householder who brings out 
things both new and old.? The new doctrine was linked 
to the doctrine which was familiar to the auditor,—to 


1 Matt, xiii. 52. 2 Matt. xiii. 13-15, Luke viii. 10. 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 459 


the truths of the Old Testament. The new was held up 
as the complement of the old, and commended to accept- 
ance as the corollary of accepted beliefs. Ideas that reached 
higher and deeper than anything before known, and which 
involved the eventual displacement of the whole fabric of 
the existing cultus, were so inculcated as not to produce an 
absolute break with the old system on the part of the dis- 
ciples of the new. A bridge was laid between the two, so 
that there might be a continuity in the development of the 
minds of the disciples, that should correspond to the 
unity, which, notwithstanding the newness of the Gospel, 
bound together the two dispensations. With a wisdom so 
sublime were the foundations of the kingdom laid in the 
gradually educated perceptions and principles of those who 
were sympathetic with its spirit. 

If our design were to describe at length the qualities of 
Jesus as a teacher, one topic would be the manner in which 
casual incidents and circumstances were made the occasion 
of bringing out fundamental truth. Principles which lie 
at the foundation of ethics and religion, and are the germ 
of changes of incalculable moment in the life of individu- 
als and of society, were dropped, so to speak, by the way- 
side, in the form of a comment upon some occurrence, or as 
a response to questions pertaining to an immediate practi- 
cal interest. The whole subsequent history of Christian 
society was to furnish, perpetually, new illustrations of the 
wealth of meaning which these wayside utterances con- 
tained, and of the power that lay in them to breathe a new 
spirit into the civilization of mankind. 


Another means adopted by Jesus for the establishment 
of His kingdom was the selection of a band of Disciples 
who should be qualified by association with Him to promul- 
gate the Gospel, and to act, in some measure, as His rep- 


460 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


resentatives. It was not by a spontaneous act on the part 
of a portion of His hearers who felt themselves powerfully 
drawn to Him, that the band of disciples was formed. It 
was made up of those who did feel themselves thusattracted, 
but their separation from the rest of the believers, and the 
special place allotted them, was by the distinct appointment 
of Jesus Himself: “ Ye have not chosen Me, but I have 
chosen you” (John xv. 16). Theyshared at first with their 
countrymen the idea of the Messianic kingdom as an ex- 
ternal exaltation of the theocracy. They were not wholly 
free from the hope of personal advancement under the new 
order of things." But they were not so wedded to these 
ideas as to be indocile. They were capable of feeling the 
divine excellence of Jesus, and of yielding up, under the 
influence of His character and teaching, their previous 
hopes respecting the kingdom, and whatever personal ambi- 
tion mingled with their sincere, disinterested allegiance to 
truth and righteousness. In their minds there were no 
impenetrable walls of prejudice to be demolished. There 
was no intellectual pride, or pride of caste, to obstruct the 
entrance of light. All, with the single exception of the 
Betrayer, were Galileans. At one time Jesus was moved 
to thank the Father from the depth of His soul, that in 
the righteous order of Providence truth which had been 
hidden from the wise and prudent, blinded by the conceit 
of wisdom, had been revealed to babes.? 

The presence of Judas in this company has been to many 
a perplexing fact. But it is not to be assumed that he was 
bad from the start. We must suppose that Jesus discov- 
ered in him possibilities of good out of which might grow, 
in case the Disciple should put forth the moral exertion 
that lay in his power, a character fortified in goodness. 
The choice of the disciples was an act that gave them no 


' Matt. xx. 21, Mark x. 87. 2 Matt. xi. 25, Luke x, 21. 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 461 


guaranty of salvation, and no exemption from the usual 
trial that attends every human being from the beginning 
to the end of life. Every thing turned on the use which 
Judas would make of the signal opportunities for good that 
lay in his path, and on the energy with which he would re- 
sist temptation. Respecting the foresight of Jesus in statu 
humiliationis, we should guard against rash dogmatic as- 
sumptions which the Gospel history does not warrant, and 
which would impart to His earnest exertions for the im- 
provement of men a mechanical quality. He whose pene- 
trating glance laid bare what was in man, watched with 
pain the downward steps of the unfaithful Disciple, and 
divined with unerring certainty the issue. * 

It would be a mistake to suppose that the Disciples were 
set apart solely for the purpose of being qualified to report 
the teaching and testify to the miracles of their Master, and 
to proclaim the Gospel. It was not merely as instructors 
of their brethren that these men were brought into a daily 
intimacy with Jesus. They were, besides, links in the fel- 
lowship that Jesus came to establish with all who should 
receive Him in faith. A certain intermediate relation of 
this character was sustained by those whose impression of 
Jesus was immediate, the result of personal association with 
Him. Their intuition, their feeling, they sought to com- 
municate beyond their own circle, that it might be repro- 
duced in those who not having seen yet believed.” Thus 
through their instrumentality the bounds of the spiritual 
society of which Jesus was the centre and source were to 
be extended. 

The Gospel was to be appropriated by all varieties of 


1 According to John’s Gospel (vi. 70, 71), an opportunity was virtu- 
ally given to Judas to withdraw from the company. Cf. Godet, Commen- 
taire (2d ed.) in loco. 


2 See 1 John i. 3. 


462 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


natural temperament and character. It was capable of 
being apprehended in diverse, yet not discordant, modes of 
conception. The types of doctrine which appear in the 
Apostolic teaching are the complements of each other, and 
conspire to make up a full representation of Christian truth. 


The miracles of Jesus were another of the agencies 
which He employed in founding His kingdom. This part 
of the Gospel narratives it is, which, in modern times, has 
chiefly provoked skepticism. But a sound historical judg- 
ment must admit the reality of these events. 

This is an historical question. It is high time that ora- 
cular assertions of the impossibility of such exertions of 
power as the New Testament attributes to Christ, or of the 
impossibility of proving them under any circumstances, 
should be set aside. It is impertinent, on the ground of 
some metaphysical scheme, an ἃ priori conception of the 
universe, to set these arbitrary limits to the power of spirit 
over nature. If a system of philosophy cannot find room 
for facts well attested by historical evidence, so much the 
worse for the philosophical system. The procedure of the 
recent writers upon the Life of Jesus, in the treatment of 
the accounts of miracles in the Gospels, is commonly de- 
termined by their subjective conclusions or conjectures as 
to the control which may conceivably be exercised by will 
over matter. One will allow the historical verity of the 
cure of demoniacs, on the ground that such an influence 
on the part of Jesus is thought to be psychologically ex- 
plicable, without departing so very widely from our ordi- 
nary experience. Another, like Strauss, would draw a line 
between the lighter and more manageable cases of demonia- 
cal frenzy, which are allowed to have been subject to the 
control of Jesus, and the more aggravated forms of mental 
and physical disorder which were ascribed, truly, or not, to 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 463 


diabolic possession. A large class of writers find no Jliffi- 
culty in accepting the narratives of healing said to have 
been effected by Jesus. They can imagine Him to have 
been possessed of an extraordinary, exceptional power over 
the diseased, enabling Him to subdue these maladies. But 
when it comes to the exercise of a control over inanimate 
nature, as in stilling the waves, or multiplying the loaves, 
they draw back with unbelief. But these seemingly highest 
exertions of miraculous power rest, as these writers are 
obliged to allow, upon the same historical attestation 
as the miraculous events to which they are willing to give 
credence. They are found recorded in what these writers 
are fully persuaded is the oldest part of the evangelical 
literature, the Gospel of Mark. It is not on_ historical 
grounds, but from considerations drawn from a quarter 
outside of historical study, that this arbitrary line of de- 
marcation between the greater and the less, where all ex- 
ceeds the measure of every-day experience, is drawn. 

We say that a sound historical discernment, founded on 
a critical study of the documentary proof, must conclude 
that from the baptism of Jesus, He manifested the power 
to work miracles such as the Evangelists record. Nothing 
of the kind is attributed to Him before that epoch, when 
His public ministry began. Exaggerated views are often 
presented in regard to the credulity of the Jews at that 
time. They did indeed believe that God might send back 
to the world John the Baptist, or one of the older pro- 
phets. But that they attributed miracles to every one re- 
vered for his sanctity is false, as the example of John the 
Baptist, of whom no miracles are recorded, decisively proves. 
And that miraculous works were not supposed to be of com- 
mon occurrence, or easy to be wrought, is demonstrated by 
the astonishment which everywhere in the narratives is 
shown to have been the effect of the miracles of Jesus. 


464 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


An historical student, not warped by any preconceived 
metaphysical or physical theory, who surveys the whole 
field, will be persuaded that Jesus, with the prophecies 
before Him, never could have believed Himself to be the 
Messiah, had He not found Himself possessed of this power 
to work miracles. It is equally evident that had He not 
evinced this power in the most impressive forms, the Dis- 
ciples, especially as He utterly abjured all political or rev- 
olutionary aims, would have disbelieved His claims. There 
would have been wanting what they considered the neces- 
sary credentials of the Christ. On examining the narra- 
tives, it is found that the works of Jesus are indissolubly 
connected with His undoubted words. The words pre- 
suppose the works, and, in certain cases, were occasioned 
by them, The works and the teaching of Jesus belong 
together. They form the totality of the manifestation, and 
cannot be divided more than the seamless garment which 
He wore. The mythical theory is wrecked upon a variety 
of difficulties which it cannot evade, or surmount. There 
was not time for a cycle of myths of this sort to arise, before 
the date of the earliest written Gospels. The circumstances, 
especially the presence of the Apostles, the recognized 
guides of the Church, would render it impossible. Besides, 
the Messianic idea, the alleged force out of which the 
myths are said to have sprung, had it been capable of such 
a product, would have precluded faith in Jesus so long as 
the expected and indispensable badges of a Messianic call- 
ing were wanting. In the Apostle Paul we have a witness 
to the early and unanimous testimony, on the part of the 
Disciples, to the Resurrection of the Lord. 

What is the Rationalistic theory of the origin of the 
Christian Religion? It is that Jesus, a carpenter of Na- 
zareth, with no prestige derived from birth or social stand- 
ing, taught in Galilee for about a year—for to this period 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 465 


tine class of whom we speak would limit His public work. 
From these brief labors, made up wholly of verbal instruc- 
tion, came that profound impression of His superhuman 
dignity, which was made indelibly upon His Disciples, and 
which His crucifixion as a criminal did not weaken, and 
that transforming power which went forth upon them, and, 
in ever increasing measure, upon all subsequent generations. 
The Apostolic Church, the conversion of Paul and _ his 
Epistles, the narratives of the four Gospels, with all that 
they contain, and Christianity, as it appears in the history 
of mankind, all spring from that one year of mere teaching! 
The effect is utterly disproportionate to the cause assigned. 

It is much more consistent with a sound philosophy, 
instead of taking refuge in an unreasonable denial of facts 
historically established, to seek to comprehend them. At 
the outset, the notion should be banished that miracles are 
repugnant to nature; that the super-natural is anti-natural. 
There is one system; and supernatural agency, however it 
may modify the course of nature, does no violence to the 
universal order. For there is no such unbending rigidity 
in the course of nature, that it cannot be modified by the 
interposition of voluntary agency. A steam-ship, cutting 
its way through the billows in the teeth of wind and tide, 
moves by the force of machinery which is contrived and 
directed by the human will. The volitions of men pro- 
duce an effect which nature, independently of this spiritual 
force, could never occasion. Now of the limits of the pos- 
sible control of matter by the power of spirit, any more 
than of the essence and origin of matter itself, we cannot 
speak. It is a presumptuous affirmation that there is no 
being in the universe who can infinitely outdo the power of 
man, vast as it is, in this direction. 

In the study of the Scriptural narratives of the miracles 
of Jesus, various interesting questions as to the mode in 


30 


466 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


which they were performed, suggest themselves. On the 
part of the Apostles, faith was an indispensable requisite,— 
acertain conscious fellowship with God, a laying hold of 
divine power.’ Without this mental state, they were 
unable to do the work. For the want of it they failed 
in the attempt.2 Of Jesus Himself it is said that at 
Nazareth, in His own country “He did not many works 
because of their unbelief” (Matt. xiii. 58). In Mark, the 
statement is: ‘‘He could there do no mighty work, save 
that He laid His hands upon a few sick folk and healed 
them ” (Mark vi. 5). There is no ground for the assertion 
that He made the attempt to work miracles, and failed. 
What would have been the effect of such abortive efforts on 
the faith of His disciples in His Messianic claim? There is 
more plausibility, especially in view of Mark’s statement, 
in the theory that the outgoing of the miraculous power of 
Jesus was, in the order of things, conditioned on faith in 
the recipient of the benefit,—that is conditioned according 
to some physical law ; so that He was literally not able to 
perform the miracles where faith was absent. But this 
idea is not sustained by an examination of other parts of 
the evangelical history ; and the meaning of the Evangelist 
may, perhaps, be exhausted if we assume that the want of 
faith on the part of the people, disabled Him in a moral 
sense—-rendered it incompatible with His plan, and with 
wisdom, to exert His miraculous agency. At the same 
time, it must be remembered that the possession and exer- 
cise of these extraordinary powers are far removed from all 
kinship with magic. Rather do they fit into the universal 
system by links of connection which, in the present state of 
our knowledge, it may be impossible to detect, but the ex- 
istence of which there is no reason to call in question. 


1 Matt. xiv. 31, xvii. 20, Mark xi. 22, 23, Luke xviii. 6. 
2 Matt. xvii. 17. 


THE PLAN OF JESUS. 467 


One conspicuous circumstance in the miracles was a 
requirement that those on whom, or for whose benefit, they 
were wrought, should have some degree of faith in Jesus. 
It is a fallacious objection—little more than a cavil—to 
say that proof of the Messianic commission of Jesus was 
thus afforded to those who already acknowledged it. The 
miracle reinforced faith. It fell in with all other ex- 
pressions of the wisdom and goodness of Jesus, as a natural 
accompaniment. But the aim was to kindle a new spirit- 
ual life, and where the germ of this life did not exist, the 
miracle would have been in vain. A gardener waters the 
ground which exhibits any signs of fertility, but he does 
not pour water on the sand. The mere excitement of 
wonder, unattended by any deeper insight, was something 
that Jesus was sedulous to avoid. The introduction of a 
new life in humanity was the end in view; and in this cre- 
ative agency divine power made itself signally manifest, 
not to extort a blind homage, nor to stir up a profitless 
amazement, but to bring the divine in more evident contact 
with souls inwardly prepared in some degree for the new 
fellowship. They whose consciences and hearts were not 
affected could attribute phenomena, the presence of which 
they were not able to deny, to diabolic agency.’ Belief in 
the miracles is contingent on the impression made by the 
entire personality of Jesus, upon the feeling excited by His 
whole character and teaching, and by the moral transfor- 
mation of which He is the Author. Where there is no ade- 
quate appreciation of the Gospel in these relations, the 
narrative of the miracles will be discredited. 


Such was the plan of Jesus, and these the means on 
' which He relied for accomplishing it. It was the estab- 
lishment of a society of which He is the living Head; a 


1 Matt. xii. 24, Mark iii. 22, Luke xi. 15. 


468 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


society the life of which is in its fellowship with Him. 
Each member of this society was to be a centre of light. 
By example, if not by active persuasion, He was to draw 
others into the right path. The followers of Jesus were 
to preach the Gospel everywhere. The world was to be 
conquered by preaching ! 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 469 


CHAPTER XV. 
THE SEPARATION OF THE CHURCH FROM THE TEMPLE. 


CHRISTIANITY was born of Judaism: it was the off- 
spring of the Old Testament religion. How was it to 
break from the leading-strings of its parent, and to realize 
in consciousness the new and independent attributes that 
belonged to it? How was it to cast off the trammels 
that lay upon it of necessity at its origin, and to go forth 
in the freedom of its universal office as a religion for the 
world? 

It might be expected, on a superficial view, that Christ 
would so explicitly define the relation of the new to the 
old, that no error and no perplexity could exist upon the 
question, and no interval be required to effect the transi- 
tion. But to emancipate Christianity from its connection 
with Judaism by a mere dictum, to produce so momentous 
a change by a word of command, would not only contra- 
dict the usual methods of Providence, but violate the very 
nature of Christianity as a system resting on the intelligent 
apprehension of truth. A sudden, violent rupture with 
the Old Testament system was not a thing to be desired. 
Rather were the old things to pass away, not as the result 
of a fiat, but by the natural expulsive power of the new. 
It was not a method of antagonism and destruction, but 
of fulfilment. Hence Christ set forth the seminal ideas of 
the new kingdom, and left them, through the Spirit and 
the agency of Providence, to produce in their own time 


470 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the proper fruit. That the institutions of the Gospel 
were to be diverse from those of the old economy, was 
involved in what He said about Fasting, that new wine 
must be put finto new bottles, that a new piece of cloth 
must not be sewed into an old garment.' He really 
undermined the ritual respecting meats and drinks, when 
He said that not what goeth into the mouth defileth a man, 
but that defilement is of the heart, and comes through bad 
feelings and purposes.” He pointed out the essentials of 
goodness, when He taught that ‘mercy is better than sac- 
rifice” (Matt. ix. 13), and that one who perceives that the 
love of God and man is “ more than all whole burnt-offer- 
ings and sacrifices ” is “ not far from the kingdom of God ” 
(Mark xii. 33-34). The illustrations of the fulfilment of 
the law which He came to effect, in the Sermon on the 
Mount, relate exclusively to the moral law. How could 
Judaic exclusiveness long abide in connection with the 
Gospel doctrines of the infinite worth of the soul, the im- 
partial benevolence and compassion of God, and love as the 
substance and end of the law? The conscious authority of 
Christ as competent to supersede that of the Old Testa- 
ment enactments, is indicated in His precepts respecting 
divorce,* in His declaration that the Son of Man is Lord 
of the Sabbath,‘ and in His declaration that He and His 
disciples were bound by no obligation to pay the tax to the — 
temple (Matt. xvii..24-27).° How pregnant, in the cir- 

1 Matt. ix. 17; Mark ii. 22; Luke v. 37. 

2 Mark vii. 14-24. One verse (ver. 19) of this passage is quite explic- 
it. The true reading is καθαρίζων πάντα τὰ Bpduwara—“ which cleanseth 
all kinds of food.” Cf. Meyer in loco; Lightfoot, Colossians, p. 259. 

3 Matt. xix. 8; Mark x. 5. 4 Mark ii. 28; Luke vi. 5. 

5 That the reference is to the temple-tax is proved by the term “ chil- 
dren,” which would not be used of the relation of Christ to the Roman 
sovereignty. That the disciples are included with Himself in the 


exemption from the obligation, is shown by the “we” in v. 27—lest 
“we should offend them ;” although Meyer argues against this view. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE, 471 


cumstances under which it was made, was the declara- 
tion that “in this place is one greater than the temple!” 
(Matt. xii. 6). The temple—the seat of the Shechinah, 
the visible majesty of the divine presence — released 
the priesthood from the strict observance of the sabbat- 
ical Jaw. They might offer their sacrifices. How 
‘much higher the claim to liberty on the part of the 
Disciples through their connection with Him! How 
natural to conclude that He who was greater than the 
temple is to take its place! How consonant with this de- 
claration is the saying reported by John, that worship is to 
be confined to no sanctuary, but is acceptable to the Father 
when offered in spirit and in truth (John iv. 23, 24)! 
Then there were predictions of the downfall of the temple, 
of the letting out of the vineyard “to other husband- 
men.”' Above all, the one essential thing was made to be 
the relation of men to Himself; the single test of character 
was belief, or unbelief; the one source of communion with 
God was personal fellowship with Himself. This funda- 
mental relation would eventually be seen to supersede every 
other priesthood and sacrifice. What was transient in the 
tenets and practices of the disciples, who had grown up 
under the Judaic system, would be cast off by the expan- 
sive force of the new truth. 

Such was the teaching of Jesus with reference to the 
ceremonial law. He did not formally abolish it. He in- 
sisted on the subordinate value of sacrifices, and of ritual 
observances generally; He claimed a lordship over all that 
_“‘was made for man;” but He did not sweep away by any 
express ordinance the worship of the temple, and He said 
nothing respecting circumcision. That a certain prece- 

1 Matt. xxiv. 12, Mark xiii. 2, Luke xxi. 6, John ii. 19, Matt. xxi. 41, 


Mark xi, 9. 


Ὁ This is substantially the conclusion of Ritschl, Entstehung d. altkath. 
Kirche, p- 34 (ed, 2). 


472 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


dence belonged to the Jews in respect to the opportunity 
of hearing the Gospel was recognized in His own me- 
thod of proceeding; but the Gospel was to be preached to 
every creature, and faith was made the condition of sal- 
vation. 

We have now to trace the steps by which the Church 
became enlightened as to the privileges of the Gentiles, and 
gradually threw off the swathing bands which enveloped it 
in its infancy. We shall find that each of the leading 
Apostles had an appointed part, peculiar to himself, to ful- 
fil,in the advance to this result. The authorities on which 
we depend for our knowledge of the facts, are the Epistles, 
in particular the Epistles of Paul—and here the second 
chapter of the Galatians is the most important passage— 
and the book of Acts by Luke. That the Gospel was to be 
carried to the heathen, all understood. The prophecies of 
the Old Testament, and the directions of the Master left no 
doubt on this point. But the question was what should 
be required of the heathen converts. In case they believed, 
were they not to be incorporated with the Chosen People 
by the rite of circumcision ? 

For a considerable time after the Ascension, the disciples 
xonstituted, to be sure, a body, fraternally united; and the 
force of the principle that bound them together is mani- 
fest in the picture, as it is drawn by Luke,’ of the in- 
fant community, meeting for praise and fellowship, and 
pouring their property into the common treasury for the 
relief of the poor. But they were still Jews, frequenting 
the temple, observing the ritual, and not thinking that there 
could be any door of admission to the blessings of salva- 
tion for the Gentiles, except through circumcision and con= 
formity to the ceremonies of the law. The Gentiles must 
become Jews, proselytes of righteousness, before they could 


1 Acts 11. 41-47. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 473 


gain access to the kingdom of Christ. To the conversion 
of the Jews their efforts were first to be directed. 

The earliest symptoms οἵ ἃ more liberal view appear among 
Hellenists, the Greek-speaking Jews who had embraced 
the Gospel. We must guard against the supposition that 
the foreign Jews were uniformly of a more liberal temper 
than their brethren in Palestine. This was far from being 
always the case. They might even be stiffened in their 
legalism by their constant practical antagonism to the 
customs of the heathen. Yet sometimes the effect of 
this contact was to soften prejudice, and awaken sym- 
pathy. In the Apostolic history, the Hellenists first 
appear in the act of making a complaint that their 
poor did not get a due share of the common fund; which 
led to the appointment of seven deacons to relieve the 
Apostles of the whole business of distributing alms." One 
of these was Stephen. He may have been of Hellenistic 
birth, although his name does not prove that such was the 
fact.? Stephen stands forth as a forerunner of Paul—the 
same Paul who took part in destroying him. His fer- 
vent preaching brought upon him a tempest of Jewish 
wrath. He was charged with speaking blasphemous words 
against Moses; and, before the Sanhedrim, he was accused 
of having said that Jesus of Nazareth would destroy the 
temple, and “change the customs” which Moses had de- 
livered (Acts vi. 14). These things were attributed to him 
by “false witnesses ;” but something of the kind he had 
said to give occasion and material for the distorted repre- 
sentation. The tone of his defence accords with this hy- 
pothesis. Alluding to the temple of Solomon, he calls to 
minc the truth that the Almighty dwells not in temples 
made with hands. There is no disdain of the temple, 
for he speaks of it as built in response to the prayer of 


1 Acts vi. 1-6. ᾿ 2Cf. Acts i. 23. 


474 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


David (vers. 46, 47); but there is a large, spiritual view of 
the nature of religion. This is followed by an unsparing de- 
nunciation of the Jewish blindness, which of old had perse- 
cuted the prophets, and now at length had slain the Messiah. 

The persecution for which the martyrdom of Stephen 
gave the signal, for the time broke up and dispersed the 
church at Jerusalem,—the Apostles only remaining in that 
city. This was in the year 33 or 34, about two years after the 
day of Pentecost. The result was a more decided step to- 
wards opening the doors of the Church to the Gentiles, 
Among those who were driven away from Jerusalem was 
Philip, another of the deacons, who went to a city of 
Samaria, the name of which is not given by Luke, and 
there preached with success; whereupon Peter and John 
came to give their sanction to the work, and lay hands 
upon the converts (Acts viii. 14seq.). Such a lesson as 
Jesus had given in the Parable of the Good Samaritan, 
His rebuke of the spirit of the disciples when they would 
have called down vengeance on the heads of the inhospitable 
Samaritan villagers (Luke ix. 55), and his own labors at 
Sichem (John iv.), prepared the Apostles to give their 
countenance to this enterprise of Philip. The reception 
of the Samaritans who, although they believed in the law 
of Moses and were circumcised, were counted heretics by 
the orthodox Jews, paved the way, in some measure, for the 
communication of the Gospel to the heathen themselves. 
The conversion by Philip, and the baptism, of the Ethio- 
pian chamberlain, who was not a Jew, even if he were a 
proselyte of the gate (which is doubtful), was a still more 
advanced measure (Acts viii. 27-40). 

The next epoch in this history is the enlightenment of 
the Apostle Peter, through a vision, and his intercourse 
with the Roman Centurion, Cornelius, by which the preju- 
dice of the Apostle is conquered, and he is convinced bott 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 475 


of the lawfulness of eating with a Gentile, and of the fact 
that the heathen may be admitted directly to share in the 
heavenly good offered in the Gospel (Acts x). That Peter 
had adopted these freer views is proved by his conduct at 
Antioch at a later day (Gal. 11.12). ΤῸ is difficult to con- 
ceive how so great a revolution of opinion and feeling could 
have occurred in such a man, without the intervention of 
some objective fact, like that which Luke records. Thus the 
credibility of Luke is supported by the probabilities in the 
case. The truth flashed upon the Apostle’s mind that God 
is no respecter of persons, and that in every nation, “he 
who feareth Him and worketh righteousness” is accepted 
of Him, and may come immediately to Christ, and to God 
through Him. The brethren at Jerusalem, however, were 
not prepared for this catholic proceeding of Peter, and this 
new interpretation of the Gospel. They “contended against 
him;” they demanded an explanation. When Peter told 
his story, and appealed to the fact that the Holy Spirit was 
given to the Gentile believers in the same form and mea- 
sure as to the Jews, the scruples of the Jewish Christians 
were satisfied (Acts xi. 18). 

Meantime there were those who were carrying out the 
catholic principle on a broader scale. Among the fugitives 
from Jerusalem at the death of Stephen, some travelled 
as far as Phoenicia, and Cyprus, and Antioch, preaching 
only to Jews. But others of the same class were residents 
of Cyprus and Cyrene—Hellenistic Jews from those places, 
who had been converted to the Gospel—and these ad- 
dressed themselves to the Grecians, the heathen, of whom 
a great number believed (Acts xi. 19-22). There were 
doubtless many earnest, truth-seeking men of the stamp of 
Cornelius, who were inwardly prepared, by sympathy with 
the Old Testament religion, to give welcome to the Gospel 
proclamation of forgiveness through Christ. Such men in- 


476 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


directly aided even the Apostles in overcoming their pre- 
judices. Antioch was the centre of these new converts; and 
when the news of the movement reached the Jerusalem 
church, Barnabas, himself a native of Cyprus, was sent 
to Antioch to look after it. 

The great agent in the deliverance of Christianity from 
the bonds of Judaism now appears in the field. The year 
35 is the probable date of the conversion of Paul. This 
young Pharisee, steeped in the lore of the school of Gama- 
hel,’ and burning with zeal for the. law with all its tradi- 
tions,” was suddenly converted from an inquisitor, eager 
to hunt down the Nazarenes, into an equally ardent, but 
pure and humble, confessor of the faith which he had been 
striving to extirpate. In answer to the question how 
this change was effected, he had only one reply to make, 
that there was a revelation of Christ to him. It was not 
by the other Apostles, it was not by preliminary teaching, 
though the story of Jesus he was doubtless familiar with, 
that his conversion was produced (Gal. i. 12, 16; 1 Cor. 
xv. 8). The only point of attachment in his previous 
mental state, which his own statements, or the narrative 
by Luke, warrant us in assuming, is the sincerity and 
earnestness, however misdirected, with which he had em- 
barked in what he considered the service of God. He 
had entered into the Jaw-method of salvation with his 
whole heart and soul. The crisis in which it was revealed 
to him that Jesus was not a false, but the true, Messiah, 
was necessarily attended, or followed, by an inward revolu- 
tion in his views, not less than in his temper and character. 
The reality of sin, and the inadequacy of law to cope with 
sin, or to purify conscience, stood before his mind in the 
clearest light; and hence the antithesis of the new dispen- 
sation to the old, of salvation by obedience and works, to 


1 Acts xxii. 3. 2 Phil. 111. 5, 6. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 417 


salvation by grace and through faith, was sharply defined 
to his mental perception. To require ceremonial obser- 
vances of a believer—of a Gentile, obliged to them by no 
national custom—was to mix up two heterogeneous sys- 
tems, to divide the work of man’s salvation between 
Christ and a ritual, to make Him insufficient as a source of 
pardon and of fellowship with God. It was, in fact, 
another Gospel, a denial of the true Gospel. It was not to 
the ceremonial law alone, but also to all law, considered as 
a practicable means of righteousness, that Paul was hostile. 
It was the promises of the Old Testament, promises that 
antedated the Mosaic dispensation, which the Gospel carried 
out (Rom. iv. 12 seq.; Gal. iii. 17 seq.). During the three 
years next following his conversion, all that we know of 
Paul is that he went into Arabia, and “returned again to 
Damascus.” This fact of a sojourn in Arabia we learn from 
himself, and if known to Luke, it is not mentioned by him. 
Nor do we know whether this interval was passed in se- 
clusion, or in preaching the new faith. Having returned 
to Damascus, he was obliged to flee from the hostility of 
the Jews, who were embittered against him from the outset, 
and through all his career; and then it was that, in the 
year 38, seven years after Christ had departed from visible 
intercourse with His disciples, Paul spent fifteen days with 
Peter in Jerusalem.” A memorable visit, and a fact fraught 
with interest in its bearing on the evidences of Christianity ! 
Who can doubt that among the matters on which they would 
confer, none would be more prominent than the subject of 
the relation of the Gospel to the law, of the religion of Christ 
to the statutes of Moses? Thence Paul proceeded to Tar- 
sus, his native city, and he is lost to our knowledge for the 
next five years—five busy years, we cannot doubt, in which 
he was endeavoring to convince men of the truth. In this 


ΤῸ 51: i, 17. 1Galwieels- 


478 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


interval may have occurred the scourgings and the ship- 
wrecks, of which he makes pathetic mention (2. Cor xi, 
24, 25), but which find no place in Luke’s history. Tar- 
sus was a cultivated city, and a seat of philosophical study. 
It is much more probable that Paul acquired his knowledge, 
such knowledge as he had, of Greek thought, from personal 
intercourse with those in whose company he would be cast, 
than from the study of theGreek authors. ‘The strictness of 
his Pharisaical training would bave naturally kept him away 
from heathen writings, nor does his style give evidence of a 
familiarity with them. He was educated in the Rabbini- 
cal schools, and traces of his youthful training are evident 
inhis Epistles. At the same time, his powerful mind was 
quick to take up and assimilate whatever bore an affinity 
to Christian truth, in the current thinking with which he 
was brought into contact. 

Barnabas, who had been sent by the Jerusalem Church 
to Antioch—who is a kind of connecting link between the 
two churches—entered heartily into the work of convert- 
ing the heathen and gathering them into the Christian fold. 
Feeling the need of assistance, he went to Tarsus after 
Paul; and, in the year 43, brought him to Antioch, where 
they continued their labors together with great success. 

About this time there occurred two events which were 
not without an important influence in keeping up a good 
understanding between the new community at Antioch and 
the mother Church.’ One was the martyrdom of James, 
the brother of John, who was put to death by Herod Agrip- 
pa, in the year 44; in consequence of which the Apostles 
appear to have withdrawn from Jerusalem. This persecu- 
tion, like that which followed the death of Stephen, led 
to an increase of missionary work abroad. James, the 


1 See Professor Lightfoot’s Excursus, “St. Paul and the Three,” Gala- 
hans, p. 293. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 479 


brother of Christ, from this time appears as the head of the 
Church at Jerusalem, having virtually the character and 
standing of an Apostle. The departure of the Apostles 
might naturally tend to lower somewhat the authority 
tacitly conceded to that Church. The other event was a 
famine, or dearth of provisions, which began in the same year, 
and lasted for a considerable time. The disciples at Anti- 
och came forward with contributions for the aid of their 
poor brethren in Jerusalem. These gifts, Luke states (Acts 
xi. 80; xii. 25), were transmitted by the hands of Barna- 
bas and Paul. But as Paul, in the 2d chapter of Gala- 
tians, where he carefully recounts the circumstances of his 
intercourse with the other Apostles, makes no mention of 
this visit, it is not improbable that he was prevented from 
accomplishing it. It is possible that he went for a part of 
the distance, and was prevented, for some reason, from 
entering the city ; or the Apostles may have been absent. 
The surprising growth of the Gentile Church at Antioch 
could not fail to excite attention, and awaken misgivings. 
There the disciples first began to be called Christians ; and 
properly, for there they first became Christians in the full 
sense,—a body distinct from the Jews. Before, they had 
called one another “ brethren,” and had been termed by their 
enemies, by way of opprobrium, Nazarenes, Galileans, or 
Ebionites. It was natural that anxieties should arise at 
Jerusalem, when the Jewish Christians saw the rapid pro- 
gress of the Gentile Church in the flourishing capital of 
Roman Asia. It was not now a question about a few indi- 
viduals, as when Peter had succeeded in quieting the objec- 
tions of those who were dissatisfied with his conduct in the 
affair of Cornelius. A multitude of the heathen were 
pressing in; and the question as to circumcision and the 
law must inevitably come up again for adjudication. What- 
ever fears and suspicions, however, may have arisen on 


480 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


this score, they found, it appears, no public expression 
until a number of years after Paul had commenced his 
labors at Antioch. There were added to the Church at 
Jerusalem some converts from the Pharisaic party,—per- 
sons, it is likely, possessed of social influence, and retaining 
their strict views about the claims of the ritual, and the 
pollution incurred by intercourse with the Gentiles.’ At 
length, on the return of Paul and Barnabas from their first 
missionary journey, the question was brought to an issue. 
Certain persons from Judea declared to the heathen converts 
at Antioch that unless they should be circumcised they could 
not be saved. This position Paul and Barnabas disputed. 
It was finally resolved that Paul and Barnabas and other 
deputies should go to Jerusalem and confer with the Apos- 
tles and elders there upon the subject of this debate. 


Such was the occasion of the Apostolic Conference in the 
year 52; one of the principal landmarks in the history 
which we are pursuing. Of this convention we have an 
account in the fifteenth chapter of Acts; and, also, state- 
ments respecting the same visit from Paul himself, in the 
second chapter of Galatians. The two accounts are supple- 
mentary to each other, Paul’s reference being to the private 
interview which he held with the Apostles, and Luke de- 
scribing the general meeting before which the main ques- 
tion was laid.? Fourteen years had passed since Paul’s first 
visit to Peter; seventeen years since his conversion, and 
about twenty-one years since the Resurrection of the Lord. 


It was demanded of Paul by certain Judaizers that Titus, 
who was with him, should be circumcised ; to which Paul 
returned a resolute denial. Titus being of Gentile extrac- 
tion on both sides, and the demand being made by those 
who asserted that circumcision was necessary for salva- 


1 Acts xv. 5. 2 See above, p. 308. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 481 


tion, Paul steadfastly refused to comply with it. He 
explained to Peter, James, and John the character of 
his preaching. They had nothing to add to it; nothing 
to prescribe or suggest by way of addition or correction. 
But when they saw from the reports and information 
which they received, that Paul was doing a great work of 
God among the Gentiles, as Peter was doing a like work 
as a preacher to the Jews, they gave the right hand of fe!- 
lowship to Paul and to Barnabas, and bade them God- 
speed. The converts of Paul were still to send up gifts for 
the poor Christians at Jerusalem, of whom there appear to 
have been many,—an act of fraternal kindness which the 
Apostle needed no entreaty to induce him to fulfil. At 
the more public assembly which Luke describes (although 
the language of Paul (Gal. ii. 2) implies that such a meet- 
ing was held),* there was a prolonged, and probably a 
heated, debate. At length Peter rose, and referring to his 
own experience in connection with the vision, and the con- 
version of Cornelius, gave his voice against the Judaizing 
proposition, and in favor of granting full liberty to the 
Gentile believers. Paul and Barnabas followed with a 
narrative of what they had done, and especially of the mira- 
eles which God had given them the power to perform in con- 
junction with their preaching. This had a decisive effect 
upon their auditors. James saw the hand of God, and, as was 
characteristic of him, saw the verification of prophecy, in the 

1 Did the “ pillar’ Apostles sympathize with the wish that Titus 
should be circumcised? Paul does not inform us on this point. Pro- 
fessor Lightfoot is inclined to think that at first they did. See his 
Galatians, p. 105. Whether they did or not, it is clear that they did 
not persist in this request, but supported Paul, notwithstanding his re- 
fusal to comply with it. Paul’s style, (Gal. 11. 3, 4,) in referring to this 
transaction, his broken sentences, and “ shipwreck of grammar,” as Dr. 
Lightfoot calls it, betray his deep agitation of feeling, even in the recol- 


lection of the painful scene. 
? See above, p. 302. 


Ε 


482 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


conversion of the Gentiles of which they had heard. His 
judgment was that these converts should not be troubled ; 
that only a few restrictions should be laid upon them,— 
namely, that they should abstain from eating meat slain as 
an offering to idols, from fornication, from things stran- 
gled,and from blood. The import of the first prohibition 
we have already considered.+ Blood, the symbol of the 
life, and made sacred for sacrificial purposes, might not be 
eaten by the Jew; and, for this reason, an animal killed 
by strangling, with the blood in him, was illicit food. To 
eat meat which had been laid upon a heathen altar might 
naturally be deemed complicity in heathen worship. The 
prescriptions are substantially those which were required 
of proselytes of the gate. There is a want of agreement 
as to the bearing of the reason assigned by James, and by 
the Council which accepted his judgment, for their proced- 
ing: “ For Moses of old time hath in every city them 
that preach him, being read in the synagogues every Sab- 
bath-day” (ver. 21). Does this mean that the Jews will be 
scandalized—the more because the law is so often brought 
to their notice—in case these things are not observed by 
the Gentile converts? [5 the motive of the restriction, so 
far as the ceremonial points are concerned, one of expedi- 
ency, to prevent needless offence to Jews and to Christians 
of Jewish birth? This is the more common interpreta- 
tion ; it is adopted by Meyer and by many other commen- 
tators.2. There is something to be said in favor of another 
view of the passage, which Neander, among others, advo- 
cates, and which would paraphrase the verse thus: As 
for the Jewish Christians, they need no injunctions, inas- 


1 See above, p, 303 seq. 

? Ritschl’s idea of the passage is that inasmuch as there were, in all 
the cities, Jews to be won to the Gospel, for this reason even the Gen- 
tiles must observe these few things. Hnste. d. altkath. Kirche, p. 129. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 483 


much as they know what they are to do from the written 
law which is read every Sabbath.’ We are inclined, how- 
ever, to the opinion of Erasmus, that the intent of the 
statement is to reassure those who feared that, if this ex- 
emption were granted to the Gentiles, the Mosaic law 
would be neglected or contemned by persons of Jewish 
birth. There was no fear of this; the law was read on 
every Sabbath. James seems to have held an intermediate 
position between the Judaizers on the one hand, and those, 
if such there were, who would abolish all ritual restric- 
tions upon the Gentiles, on the other. He expected that 
the Jewish Christians—that branch of the Church—would 
continue to observe the Levitical ceremonies. This is 
shown in the xxist chapter of the Acts, in what he said to 
Paul on the occasion of his last visit to Jerusalem. So 
far all were agreed; for Paul was far from disapproving of 
circumcision and the other ritual customs, as practiced by 
Jews, and when regarded as a national, theocratic insti- 
tute. His point was that they are not a means of salva- 
tion, a ground of justification, and are not to be imposed 
upon the Gentiles. He circumcised Timothy, whose mother 
was a Jewess; and he went through the ceremonies per- 
taining to a vow (Acts xxi. 26). He had the difficult part 
to perform of not appearing as an antagonist of Moses, 
an apostate from the Old Testament system, at the same 
time that he should stand squarely upon the higher plane of 
development which had been introduced by the Gospel, and 
save the new system from being adulterated by a mixture 
of obsolete elements drawn from the old. His consum- 
mate prudence and forbearance, through all this long con- 
troversy, are not less admirable than his unflinching cour- 
age in adhering to essential principles, whenever they were 
in peril, in the face of all adversaries. It is a question 


? Plant. and Train. of the Church, p. 127. 


484 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


whether James did not hold that, independently of the 
motive of expediency, and the desire not to offend a pre- 
judice, these restrictions of the Apostolic decree were im- 
portant to be observed on their own account. He, and 
those who sympathized in his views, gave up the great 
point of circumcision, and most of the prescriptions of the 
ceremonial law. They might feel that while the Gentile 
converts should be allowed their liberty to this extent, the 
practices prohibited in the decree—if decree it is to be 
called—were in themselves inadmissible. 

When we connect what is said by Paul, in the 2d of 
Galatians, with the narrative of Luke, the position of 
James and of the Jerusalem Church becomes quite clear. 
The Gentile believers were looked upon as partakers of the 
great salvation, nothing being required of them except 
what was required of proselytes of the gate. They are the 
Christian Diaspora—they are even called so by Peter in 
his first Epistle—and a certain precedence belongs to the 
Mother Church, to the Jewish believers, as the first heirs 
of the promise. The temple is still the great sanctuary 
of worship; the expectation—the hope, at least—is that 
the chosen people, in a body, will acknowledge Jesus as 
the Messiah. The gifts which the older Apostles stipu- 
lated that Paul should bring up from the Gentile be- 
lievers to the Church at Jerusalem, bore some analogy 
to the contributions which the Jewish Diaspora were in 
the habit of sending to the temple.’ 

The letter announcing the result of the Conference, ad- 
dressed to the Gentile brethren in Antioch, Syria, and 
Cilicia, was conveyed by the hands of Paul and Barnabas, 
to whom were joined Judas, surnamed Barsabas, and Silas, 
or Silvanus—two leading men in the Church at Jerusalem 


1 The force of the Decree and its relation to Paul’s doctrine and teach- 
ing, are considered in chapter ix. of the work, p. 301 seq. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 485 


—and was received at Antioch with joy. Silas was soon 
again at Antioch, and became a companion of Paul on his 
second missionary journey. The conclusion of the Con- 
ference served to calm the troubled waters. It really 
secured to the Gentiles an exemption from the yoke which 
the Judaizers would have laid upon them. But there were 
many questions which it did not decide, with respect to the 
relations of the Gentile to the Jewish converts. Or if it 
decided them logically and by fair inference, the legitimate 
corollaries might not always be deduced even by those who 
assented to the result in good faith. We have another 
chapter in the great controversy, in the conflict of Peter and 
Paul at Antioch, on a subsequent occasion. When this 
occurred we have no sure means of ascertaining. It was 
certainly after the Apostolic Conference. Peter was in that 
city. He had sat down at the Agape, or Love-feasts, with 
the Gentile brethren, and had eaten with them without any 
scruples of conscience. This course we should expect of 
him in view of what he had learned at the time of his 
intercourse with Cornelius, and of his utterances at the 
Council. Indeed, as we have said, his liberality of feeling, 
as manifested in his conduct, is not explicable except on the 
supposition of this prior enlightenment. But some persons 
came to Antioch “ from James ”’—on what errand, we are 
not informed,—but they were persons of consideration in 
the Church of Jerusalem, and were among those who did 
not approve of this free intercourse with the uncircumcised, 
which Peter, in common with Paul and Barnabas, prac- 
ticed. It wasan exhibition of fraternal feeling which Paul 
deemed to be required by “the truth of the Gospel,’’ the 
great doctrine of salvation by faith, and to be warranted by 
the Apostolic decree. It does not follow, however, that 
the visitors from Jerusalem gave so broad a construction to 
that document. They may have understood it simply as 


480 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


conceding that the Gentile believers were brethren, and in 
asalvable condition; and yet they may have felt themselves 
authorized, and constrained by conscientious feeling, to stop 
short of that sort of social intercourse which might seem to 
sweep away utterly the barriers between Jew and heathen. 
They were influential persons; it is not unlikely that thesame 
view of the Apostolic decree was taken by James himself, 
The presence of these Christians from Jerusalem led Peter, 
out of a timid deference to a prejudice in which he had shown 
that he did not personally share, to cease to eat with the Gen- 
tiles as he had done; and such was the force of his example, 
that the rest of the Jewish Christians at Antioch, including 
even Barnabas, took the same course. This crisis moved 
Paul to rebuke Peter, in the presence of the Church, for his 
cowardly and insincere compliance. He did not accuse 
him of holding a wrong principle, for his principles were 
right, but of inconsistency, and of infidelity to his real 
convictions. The effect of Peter’s example, if it were not 
counteracted, would be to make the Gentile converts feel 
that they must ‘‘Judaize,” or conform to the ceremonial 
ordinances of the law; and this influence would be specially 
potent from their seeing Peter change his course. Peter 
“had been condemned,” for this is the meaning of the 
Greek (κατεγνωσμένος ἦν) which is rendered, “for he was 
to be blamed.’”’ “ His conduct carried its own condemna- 
tion;’! but the phraseology probably implies that it was 
condemned by the Antiochian Christians who witnessed it.’ 
Once more the Apostle Paul stood in the breach to defend 
the liberty of the Gentile converts, and to maintain the 
catholic character of the religion of Christ. 

One thing was settled, so far as the united voice of the 
Apostles, and the prevailing judgment of the Jerusalem 


1 Prof. Lightfoot, Galatians, in loco. 
2 See Ellicott, and Meyer, in loco. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE, 487 


Church was concerned ; and that was that the rite of cir- 
cumcision was not to be imposed upon the Gentile believ- 
ers. For this fact we have the testimony of Paul, in the 
Galatians, as well as of Luke. There might be differences 
on subordinate questions pertaining to the relations of the 
two sorts of Christians to each other; there might be 
Pharisaic believers still, who clung with characteristic per- 
tinacity to the Judaizing tenets; but the Apostles were uni- 
ted in considering the Gentiles released from subjection to 
the Mosaic ceremonial law, and in recognizing them as fel- 
low-heirs of salvation. 

The Epistle to the Galatians was written in the year 56 
or 57. Within the next two or three years, Paul wrote his 
two Epistles to the Corinthians, and his Epistle to the 
Romans. In this period, the Judaizers were active in 
their demonstrations of hostility to him personally, and in 
their efforts to pervert the Churches which were under his 
care. All this time, the Apostle keeps up his cordial and 
fraternal feeling towards the Jewish Apostles, and towards 
the brethren—the “saints” at Jerusalem—for whom he is 
collecting charitable gifts. There is no implication that his 
malignant adversaries were countenanced by them. He was 
waging an incessant war with a rancorous, intriguing faction, 
whose unchristian narrowness he condemns in the severest 
language. They are bigots, who are really aiming to sub- 
vert the Gospel. They might put the names of Peter and 
other Apostles on their party banners, for the sake of better 
opposing the Apostle to the Gentiles ; but the whole tone 
of Paul is utterly inconsistent with the supposition that he 
held the other Apostles, or the Jerusalem Church as a 
body, responsible for the Judaizing tenet, or for the conduct 
of its malicious and mischievous advocates. 

The Church at Corinth was disturbed by factions. Some 
claimed to be followers of Peter, others of Paul, and others 


488 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


still of Apollos; while a fourth party, called into existence, 
it is not unlikely, by antagonism to the other three, claimed 
to be the party “of Christ.” In the absence of definite 
knowledge as to the peculiarities of this last party, the 
most plausible conjecture is that which supposes them to 
have been inclined, with something of a rationalistic turn, 
to treat lightly Apostles and Apostolic authority altogether, 
and to have professed to go back to the instruction of Jesus 
Himself. The party that called itself by the name of 
Paul were probably disposed to push his free principles to 
excess; perhaps, as Marcion did afterwards, to dissever 
Christianity utterly from the Old Testament revelation. 
The adherents of Apollos probably mingled with personal 
partiality for this teacher, an infusion of Alexandrian 
“wisdom,” or a type of thinking which they claimed to 
derive from him. The Apostle, it is obvious, is no more 
disposed to countenance the party of Paul, than that of 
Cephas. Precisely what this last party contended for, we 
are not told. It is not intimated, however, that, like the 
Judaizers in Galatia, they demanded that the heathen con- 
verts should be circumcised. It is safe to say, that they 
called for a more legal type of piety, and claimed a higher 
precedence for the Judaic branch of the Church than the 
followers of Paul were ready to admit. In the Second 
Epistle, the Apostle speaks with severity of persons who 
had come to Corinth with letters of recommendation from 
Jerusalem, and who took similar letters on leaving Corinth 
from the Church there! He calls them sarcastically 
“supereminent Apostles,” 2 “ false Apostles,” * and deceivers. 
That these expressions refer to Peter and his co-apostles at 
Jerusalem, is one of the baseless assumptions of the school 
of Baur. Paul speaks of himself as “rude in speech,”* in 
comparison with those enemies,—an expression which he 


b2\@or, ap 1s 22 Cor. xi. 5 3 Ver. 13. * xi. 6. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 489 


would not have used with reference to the Jerusalem A pos- 
tles. Of these he speaks in a totally different tone from 
that in which he refers to the mischief-makers who claimed 
to be their adherents. For the true Apostles and for their 
flock, “the saints” at Jerusalem, he was even then solicit- 
ing gifts. 

While the Apostle was staying at Corinth, and just 
prior to his last eventful visit to Jerusalem, he wrote his 
Epistle to the Romans. The whole tone of it indicates an 
earnest desire on his part that there should be a good 
understanding between him and the Church in the capital. 
He had long wished to visit Rome, and to prosecute there 
his work as a preacher to the Gentiles (i. 13-15). Now 
the intention which he had formed of going to Spain ren- 
dered it probable that this purpose might be fulfilled (xv. 
24). He hoped to meet his Roman brethren, and after a 
sojourn with them, to be helped forward by them on his 
journey to the western frontiers of the Empire (ver. 24). 
It is evident, from this Epistle, that the Roman Church 
was made up partly of converts from Judaism, and partly 
of Gentiles. Each of these classes he directly addresses. 
“Know ye not brethren (I speak to them that know the 
Law)”’ (vii. 1), is the beginning of an argument to Jewish 
Christians.” In another place, he writes: “For I speak 
to you Gentiles” (xi. 13); and this is followed by an ex- 
tended appeal to this class. A conciliatory tone pervades 
the Epistle. He isan Israelite himself; his fervent prayer 
to God is, that the Jews as a body might be converted to 
the Gospel. He would be willing to be accursed for their 
sake (ix. 3)! He believes, notwithstanding their tempo- 
rary unbelief, in a hidden intention of God, that this 
prayer shall be verified? His hope was like that of the 

~"Cor. i, 22, iY... 2 ef. ii. 17 seq., vii. 4. 

Sef, 1.19. x. 1 segs, xi. 17, 21, 22, 26528, xv. 16. 


490 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


older Apostles, that “all Israel” should be brought. in! It 
is clear, in the first place, that the Jewish Christians in 
the Roman Church were relatively numerous; whether 
they outnumbered the Gentile converts or not, nothing 
in the Epistle enables us to decide. It is evident, se- 
condly, that they stood in no hostile relation to the 
Apostle. This is conceded by Baur. But, thirdly, it 
is impossible not to see that the Apostle had some ap- 
prehension that the natural jealousy awakened by the 
growth of the Gentile Churches, in connection with the 
unscrupulous efforts of his Judaizing antagonists, might 
imperil his relations with the Jewish Christians gen- 
erally. With the utmost earnestness he begs for the 
prayers of his brethrenat Rome that on his approaching 
visit to Jerusalem, he may not only be delivered from the 
malice of unbelieving Jews, but may have a good reception 
from his Jewish brethren there (xv. 30-32). While this 
Epistle is so mildin its tone of opposition to Judaic preten- 
sions, since the Judaizing demand that the Gentile Chris- 
tiansshould be circumcised had not yet been made at Rome, 
itcontains the most radical vindication of the liberty of the 
heathen converts. The method of salvation by obedience 
to the law is set in the sharpest contrast with the method 
of salvation by the grace of the Gospel. Whoever 
accepted the doctrine of this Epistle must have felt that 
compliance with the ceremonial code of the Old Testament 
could no longer be enforced on the ground of religious 
obligation. 

It was in A. D. 59, that the Apostle carried up to Jeru- 
salem the contribution which he had collected among the 
Gentile churches. It was not the will of Providence that 
the prayer for his deliverance from Jewish enemies should 
be fully granted. The graphic narrative of Luke (Acts 
xxi.) shows how he was warmly received by “the breth- 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 491 


ren” (ver. 17). On the day after his arrival, he held an 
interview with James and the Elders of the Church. 
His account of the spread of the Gospel among 
the heathen excited a cordial interest, and called forth ex- 
pressions of gratitude to God. But James proceeds to 
inform him that the multitude of Jewish Christians at 
Jerusalem had been told that he was in the habit of ad- 
vising the Hellenistic Jews to “ forsake Moses,” and not 
to circumcise their children. A cloud of suspicion rested 
upon him. The Jewish Christians, he was reminded by 
James and the Elders, were zealous for the law,—that is 
earnest that the law should be observed by all who were of 
Jewish birth. As for the Gentile believers, they said, the 
prescriptions of the Council defined what was expected of 
them. It is obvious that the point on which James and 
the body of the Jewish Christians insisted, was that among 
Jews and Jewish believers conformity to the ritual should 
be maintained. Nor, we repeat, is this a matter of sur- 
prise; since there was a national as well as a religious feeling 
involved, and since they did not despair of the conversion 
of their countrymen as a body. To give up the old ob- 
servances would have seemed to them like a relinquishment 
of this hope. Paul found no difficulty in acceding to the 
wish of James and the Elders that he should give a public 
proof of the falsity of the charge that he was trying to per- 
suade the Jews to abandon their ceremonial observances. 
He had not taken this course, and was willing to satisfy 
those who had been misled by false reports, that he was nu 
enemy of Moses, and was not the renegade that his ma- 
ligners asserted him to be. How far he sympathized with 
James in his view as to the continued obligation of the Gen- 
tile converts to conform to all of the recommendations of 
the Apostolic Council, isa question that must be determined 
by a careful examination of his Epistles; since on this 


492 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


point the narrative of Luke is silent. The Jews from 
Asia, who were in attendance upon the festival, seeing Paul 
in the temple, raised a ery against him, declaring, in addi- 
tion to the imputation which had been disseminated among 
the Jewish Christians, that he had also brought a heathen 
into the temple.” This last charge, as Luke with admi- 
rable candor explains, sprang out of a mistake. Trophi. 
mus, an Ephesian, had been seen with him, and it was ru- 
mored that Paul had taken him into the temple. 

Subsequent attempts of the Jews, by legal process and 
by the plots of assassins, to destroy him were baffled by the — 
protection afforded him by the Roman authorities, and by 
his appeal to Cesar.* His Epistles written from Rome 
show that the Judaizing antagonism had appeared there. 
‘He writes to the Philippians* that some near him are 
preaching Christ “of envy and strife ””—in a quarrelsome 
and partisan spirit, in the hope, by organizing a hostile 
party, to make his chain more galling. Yet he does not 
speak of them with the strong denunciation which he had 
leveled against the Galatian Judaizers. These last were not 
attempting to convert men even to their imperfect doctrine, 
but only to mislead the Gentile believers. The malignants 
at Rome were at least laboring to procure the acknowledg- 
ment of Jesus as the Christ. What a love to Christ and 
His cause must have inspired the soul of Paul, that he 
could rejoice in efforts which sprang from motives so want- 
ing in purity, and so prejudicial to his own comfort and 
good name! Writing to the Colossians, he shows that the 
Judaizers were not without a following. He says that only 
three active workers among the Jewish Christians, Aris- 
tarchus, Marcus, and Justus, stood by him as auxiliaries.® 

' On this question, see above, p. 303 seq. 2 Acts xxi. 29. 

5. Acts xxiii. 12-31, xxiv. 1 seq., xxv. 2. 4 Philippians i. 15-18. 

5 Col. iv. 10. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 493 


Such was the position of the Apostle in relation to Jews, 
Jewish Christians, and Judaizers, when the veil falls upon 
this portion of his history. 

In rejecting the exaggerations of the Tiibingen school, 
it is important not to overlook the diversities that actually 
existed in the Apostolic Church, and among the Apostles 
themselves. It is natural to ask why the “ pillar” Apos- 
tles did not vigorously support Paul when the demand was 
made that Titus should be circumcised, and why they did 
not put under the ban the Judaizers among the Galatians, 
at Corinth, and elsewhere, who were doing all they could to 
impede his work? A satisfactory answer to these ques- 
tions is that the Apostles did not arrogate to themselves the 
function of rulers, in any hierarchical sense, over the 
Christian communities which were springing up all over 
the Roman Empire, and especially would they avoid inter- 
ference with distant churches, with the circumstances of 
which they were imperfectly acquainted. They would 
have been as little disposed to interpose, as Paul would 
have been to admit their interposition, in the conflicts be- 
tween him and factious opponents in the churches which 
he had planted. The Apostles preferred to act as prophets 
rather than as bishops, and to do good by personal 
influence, rather than by official prerogative.! Wesley 
and Whitefield in the Methodist movement, Luther and 
Calvin in the Protestant Reformation, have been sug- 
gested as not inapt illustrations of the relations that 
existed among Apostolic laborers who seldom met one 
another, and who, though devoted, heart and soul, to the 
common cause, might find in one another something to 
criticise.” The Jewish Christians, all of them, were at- 
tached to the legal observances, and it might not be so easy 


' See Professor Jowett’s remarks, Epp. of St. Paul, p. 430 seq. 
? Tbid. p. 435. 


4,94 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


to draw the line where this feeling passed into an immod- 
erate and intolerant zeal. The varieties of personal char- 
acter among the Apostles should not be overlooked. In 
Peter there was a mingled boldness and timidity—a bold- 
ness like that of Luther, which might suddenly give way, 
however, to a timidity like that of Melanchthon. An ex- 
ample of this fluctuation of temper was given at Antioch 
when his courage suddenly gave way in the presence of 
strict legalists from Jerusalem. As to James, his dress 
and manner of life are depicted in an extract which 
Eusebius gives from the old Jewish Christian historian 
Hegesippus;' and although Ebionitic legends are mingled 
in this description, yet we are led by all our sources of in- 
formation to conceive of him as a devout and punctilious 
observer of the ancient ritual. To prevent the Jewish 
Christians from forsaking the ordinances of the law was 
with him a matter of much importance. The wrath of the 
Jews which nearly cost the Apostle Paul his life in his last 
visit to Jerusalem, did not at that moment bring into peril 
his fellow-Apostles. They were not suspected of attempt- 
ing to draw away either Jewish Christians or Jews from 
the Mosaic ceremonies. It is false to say that these Apos- 
tles refused to recognize Paul and his converts as brethren. 
It is true, however, that the liberty for the Gentiles, which 
he was so full of ardor in maintaining, did not in an 
equal degree engage their zeal. 

From about the time of the Apostle Paul’s final visit to 
Jerusalem, the history of the Jewish branch of the Church 
is involved in obscurity. There is no doubt that pro- 
vidential events had a decisive influence in breaking up 
the allegiance to the old ritual, of those who were not hope- 
lessly wedded to it. In the year 66, began the great war, 
when the Jews of Palestine flung themselves with reckless 


a © ae Dems \ ae 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 495 


courage into the deadly struggle with their Roman oppres- 
sors. In the year 70, Jerusalem was captured by Titus, 
and, amid horrible carnage, the temple was given to the 
flames. For three years longer, after Titus had enjoyed 
his triumph, the war was continued. From that time, the 
prostrate people, having no longer a Jewish magistracy in 
the proper sense, and with their sanctuary in ruins, had no 
rallying point except the law, as preserved and expounded 
by the Scribes. Later, they made two other desperate 
attempts to beat down their enemies. First, in a. Ὁ. 115, 
in the last part of Trajan’s reign, the Jews of Cyrene rose 
in revolt. The conflict, which was attended with enor- 
mous destruction of life, spread to Alexandria, and then to 
Cyprus. There had been a frightful massacre of the 
Greeks in Cyrene; and in Cyprus, Dion Cassius states that 
220,000 of the non-Jewish population were slain.! The 
result was that the Jews were vanquished, and none of 
their nation were suffered to step foot upon the island. 
The Jews in Mesopotamia followed the example of their 
brethren, and were likewise put down. The Jewish tradi- 
tions set the number of their people slain at this time in 
Egypt and Cyprus at 600,000.2 Once more, in A. D. 132, 
under Hadrian, who had forbidden the continuance of the 
rite of circumcision, a great insurrection of the Jews broke 
out, which was not confined to Palestine. There the 
leader was Bar-cochab—son of the star—“the star that 
was to arise out of Jacob ””—who gave himself out as the 
Messiah. In this war, into which the Jews threw them- 
selves with the same splendid daring and indomitable forti- 
tude which they always showed in contests for their free- 
dom and their religion, the number of those who perished by 
the sword is given by Dion Cassius at 580,000, besides the 
uncounted multitude who were destroyed by famine, dis- 


1 Lib. Ixviii. 32. 2 See Milman’s History of the Jews, i1. 429. 


496 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


ease, and fire. The captives were brought in droves to 
the slave-market. Judea was devastated. Then Hadrian, 
in A. ἢ. 135, converted Jerusalem into a heathen city, giv- 
ing it the name of /Mlia Capitolina. The Jewish rites of 
worship were forbidden. Heathen temples were erected ; 
and the image of a swine was placed over the door leading 
to Bethlehem. 

With the downfall of Jerusalem, the curtain falls upon 
the Church of the Circumcision. Henceforward our infor- 
mation respecting it is obscure and scanty. At the out- 
breaking of the Jewish war, the Christians had withdrawn 
to Pella, lying on the east of the Jordan. Atan earlier day, 
James had been put to death, a victim of Jewish intoler- 
ance. If, as there is reason to believe, the reference to this 
event in Josephus is genuine,’ it took place at the instiga- 
tion of the High-Priest, Ananus, in the year 62; and 
this is one proof that the account of this event which 
Eusebius reproduces from the old Jewish Christian histo- 
rian, Hegesippus, is, in part at least, lerendary. It would 
appear that a portion of the exiled church came back to 
Jerusalem after the war of Titus was over. Hegesippus 
states that Symeon, the son of Clopas, a paternal uncle of 
Jesus—Clopas was the brother of Joseph—was appointed 
bishop there after the murder of James; and that he, 
having lived to a very advanced age, perished as a martyr 
in the year 106.* The Christians had stood aloof from the 
contest with the Romans, on which the Jews staked their 
existence as a people. The murder of James indicates 
that, as the crisis was approaching, the feelings of the 
Jews had become more embittered against their Chris- 
tian countrymen. Justin Martyr informs us that in the 
subsequent insurrection, led by Bar-cochab, the Chris- 


1 Lib. Ixix. 14. ? Antiq., xx. 9, 1. 
3 Eusebius, H. E., iv. 21, iii. 32. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE, 497 


tians were fiercely persecuted by this fanatical leader.’ In 
this whole period, we learn from Jewish sources that the 
Christians were regarded with animosity by them, and 
were loaded with anathemas. Thus all the circumstances 
conspired to weaken the bond which had held the Jewish 
Christians to the Mosaic ordinances. It is highly probable 
that many of them were in the restored church of Jerusa- 
lem, and were satisfied with the Christian worship which 
was now clear of the ancient ritual. In truth, it is not 
certain that the rites of Jewish worship were permitted 
there after the conquest by Titus.? After this time, the 
Jews did not attempt to make Jerusalem their capital. 
They resorted to Jabneh (now Yebna), nearer the sea- 
coast, and just beyond the northern border of Judea. Up 
to the war made by Bar-cochab, this place was the centre 
of their learned schools, and the seat of their Sanhedrim.* 

The Church was separated from the temple by the de- 
struction of the temple. It was prior to this event that 
the Apostle John, and others with him, of whom Philip 
the Avostie was one—for it is probably the Apostle who 
died at Hierapolis, and not the Evangelist of that name— 
removed his abode to Asia Minor. The catholic spirit in 
which John carried forward his Apostolic work until he 
reached an extreme old age, is evinced by his writings, 
and by the traditions which relate to this period of his 
activity. The Jewish Christians who could not bring 
themselves to the adoption of the full freedom of Pauline 
principles fall into three classes. If we may credit the 
statement of Hegesippus, which, in this particular, there 
is no reason to distrust, they first broke off from the 
Church on the death of Symeon (A. ἢ. 106). 


1 Apol. i. 31. 2 See Renan, Les Evangiles, p. 17. 


8 See Derenbourg Hist. et Geog. de la Palestine, ch, xxiii,, Milman, Hist. 
of the τ (Am, ed.), ii. 412, 449, 451, 
2 


498 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Shortly after the war of the Jews against Hadrian, Justin 
Martyr makes mention of two classes of Jewish Christian 
sectaries, a milder party who adhered to the Mosaic ritual 
for themselves, with no hostility to the Gentile churches, 
and a stricter faction who would compel the Christian 
Gentiles to live according to the law of Moses.! These 
are evidently the parties which are known to later writers 
as Nazarenes and Ebionites. The Ebionites are described by 
Trenezus,’ Hippolytus,* and Tertullian,* the first of whom 
refers to the enmity of this sect to the Apostle Paul. They 
used the “ Gospel of the Hebrews,” which they ascribed to 
Matthew. They are also described by Epiphanius, in the 
fourth century, although the objects of his denunciation are 
strongly tinctured with Essene peculiarities. But Origen 
expressly distinguishes two divisions of the Ebionite heresy.® 
The one accepted, the other rejected, the miraculous birth 
of Jesus from the Virgin. Jerome enters into an explana- 
tion of the tenets of this more liberal sect of Jewish Chris- 
tians,’ in which we may plainly discern the successors of that 
portion of the Judaic Church which could not bring itself 
to the surrender of the Mosaic observances, at the same 
time that they recognized as brethren the Gentile believers, 
and honored the Apostle Paul. In the rigid Ebionites, we 
see with equal distinctness the remnant of the Pharisaic or 
Judaizing faction which had persistently attacked the doc- 
trine and person of the Apostle to the Gentiles. 

There is a third class of Judaizing Christians, existing 
under various modifications, with an ascetic and speculative 
tendency which is Gnostic in its character, and stamped 
with peculiarities akin to those of the Essenes. The pres- 


1 Dial. c. Trypho., 47, 48. 2 Ady. Her., I. xxvie 2 
3 Ref. omn. Her., vii. 22, x. 18. 4 De Prescr. Heret., 33. 
δ᾽ Heer., xxx. 6 ¢, Celsum, v. 61, 65. 


7 Ep. 89 ad Augustin. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 499 


ence of this type of Judaizing doctrine at Rome would 
seem to be indicated by one or two passages in the Epistle 
of Paul to the Roman Church.’ Much more evident is 
the existence of sectaries of this class among the Colossians. 
That the Essenes had found their way to that part of Asia 
Minor is not at allimpossible. The relation of the Heme- 
robaptists, disciples of John the Baptist, who formed them- 
selves into a party or sect in that region, and whose pre- 
sence is tacitly presupposed in John’s Gospel, to the Esse- 
nian Gnostics is involved in obscurity. But in Cerinthus, 
the Judaizing Gnostic, whom the tradition states to have 
been the antagonist with reference to whom the Evangelist 
wrote his Gospel,” we have a representation of the Essenian 
Ebionism, or, at least of a way of thinking resembling 
that which arose under the Essenian influence. The Esse- 
nes in Palestine were brought into connection with the 
Jewish Christians in the year 70, when the latter fled to 
Pella and the adjacent district. Here it would seem that 
many of the Essenes embraced the Gospel, not abandoning, 
however, many of their previous sectarian characteristics. 
The Elchesaits, to whom Origen refers,? were the offspring 
of this union of Judaic Christians with Essenism. The 
principal monument of the Essenian Ebionitism is the Pseu- 
do-Clementine writings, whose date is somewhere in the 
latter part of the second century.‘ 

There are New Testament documents which indirectly 
throw light upon the present topic. The Epistle to the 
Hebrews, written, it is probable, by a pupil of the Apostle 
Paul, by one imbued with his spirit and principles, not 


1 Rom. xiv. 2, 21. 2 See above p.345. ὃ Eusebius, H. E., vi. 38. 

* Upon the Jewish Christian sects, see Gieseler’s Essay in Stiudlin u. 
Tzschirner’s Archiv. f. Kirchengesch., iv. 2, Schliemann, Die Clementinen 
(1844), Ritschl, Die altkath. Kirche, pp. 108-248, Prof. Lightfoot, Colos- 
sians, p. 304 seq. See, also, Essays on the Super. Origin of Christ., p. 
311 seq. 


500 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


long before the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus, discloses 
the fact that among the Jewish Christians, for whom it 
was composed—whether they were residents of Palestine 
or of Rome, is uncertain '—there was danger of a Judaiz- 
ing schism. The Epistle of Peter—the First Epistle—is 
placed by Eusebius among the Homologoumena, or books 
universally received.2 It was in the hands of Polycarp, 
as Eusebius states, and as we know from an inspection of 
Polycarp’s Epistle ;* and the same historian tells us that 
it was used by Papias.* Peter wrote his Epistle from Ba- 
bylon,® where, on account of the number of Jews there, 
he might naturally be found. It was written to the Chris- 
tians of Asia Minor, was transmitted by the hand of Silas * 
who, originally of the Jerusalem Church, had been a 
fellow-laborer with Paul; and it sends a greeting at the 
end from Mark.’ It contains assurances of fraternal confi- 
dence in the Gentile believers of those churches which 
Paul had built up. It must have been written near the 
end of Peter’s life, and possibly it was written after the 
death of Paul, which occurred at Rome, in the year 64. 
Not long after this event, Peter himself likewise perished 
as a martyr, probably in the same place.® 

The Epistle of James has strong external attestation, it 
being found in the old Syriac version ; and it presents in- 
ternal marks of authenticity. One aim of it was to cor- 
rect abuses which had grown up in connection with the 
doctrine of justification by faith alone,—perversions of 
which the Marcionite heresy, ata later period, was a marked 
example. There is no Judaizing doctrine in this Epistle ; 

1 See the discussion of this question in Bleck’s Hinl. in d. N. T. (ed. 
Mangold), pp. 608-612. 

2 Ἢ £., iii. 8: 

3 Eusebius, H. E., iv. 15, Westcott, Canon of the N. T., pp. 34, 35. 


4 ἘΠ’ 150 lil. 39. 5 1 Pet. γ, 19, 6 Tbid., ly, 12, 7 Tbid., Υ. 13. 
8 See below, p. 514. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 501 


yet it dwells on points of Christian duty, upon the neces- 
sity of works where faith is not dead, and of the Gospel 
as the perfecting of the law, in just the strain which we 
might expect from the evangelical, yet intermediate, posi- 
tion of its author. 

The transference of the Apostle John to Asia, whose 
residence there for a long period is a fact well established, 
probably took place, as we have already stated, after the 
death of Paul, and before the Jewish war and the capture 
of Jerusalem by the Romans. The Apocalypse, which was 
written in the period of the Neronian persecution, is 
strenuous against compromises with heathenism, and speaks 
of fornication and of the eating of things offered to idols, 
in terms which imply a conscious reminiscence of the 
Apostolic decree; but this book, when fairly interpreted, 
exhibits no trace of a Judaizing spirit. The Gospel of 
John, and his 1st Epistle, which were written much later 
than the Apocalypse, show how completely the catholic 
interpretation of the Gospel had leavened the mind of the 
Apostle. That such was the tenor of his teaching in Asia 
Minor, not only the tone of his writings, but also the cha- 
racter of his influence, as it is manifest in the whole spirit 
of the writers of the second century, Ignatius, Polycarp, 
Justin Martyr, Irenzus, fully establishes. What part 
John took in the earlier discussions, we have no means of 
learning. He is one of the “pillars” of the Church at 
Jerusalem on the occasion of the Council ;? one of the 
Three who gave to Paul the right hand of fellowship. It 
does not appear that he was there when Paul made his last 
visit, and was attacked by the mob of Jews. But of the 
broad and charitable spirit which he manifested at Ephe- 
sus, in the closing period of his activity, we have sufficient 
evidence. 


1See above, 327 seq. 2 Galatians ii. 9. 


502 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


The theory has been advocated in recent times by Baur 
and his school, that in the closing part of the first century, 
the Judaizing party had gained a controlling influence in 
the Gentile Churches, so that the name and writings of the 
Apostle Paul fell into disrepute ; and that afterwards a re- 
action followed, and a harmonizing tendency, which brought 
the Pauline interest again into favor. Of such a double 
revolution, the ecclesiastical writers, on whom we must de- 
pend for our knowledge of that period, know nothing. It 
is impossible that changes of this remarkable character 
should have taken place in the churches of Asia Minor, 
and in the Church at Rome, and yet have escaped the 
knowledge of Irenzeus. He, like Tertullian, and Clement of 
Alexandria, appeal to the unbroken tradition of Apostolic 
teaching, and to the fact of a recognition of the authority 
of all the Apostles by the churches from the beginning. 
Justin Martyr’s theology is thoroughly repugnant to 
Ebionism. When we go still farther back, to the pre- 
ceding generation, we find the same to be true of the Epistle 
of Clement of Rome, the Epistle of Polycarp, and the 
Ignatian Epistles. Very precarious arguments are deduced 
by advocates of the Tiibingen theory from fragmentary 
passages of lost writings of Hegesippus and of Papias. 
But an Ebionism which Ireneus and Eusebius, who had 
the entire works of these authors in their hands, failed to 
detect, could not be of a very pronounced character. Be- 
sides, there are statements of Hegesippus which are incon- 
sistent with the supposition that he was an Ebionite;? 
and the historical position of Papias in relation to Poly- 
carp and Irenzus is sufficient of itself to refute this im- 
putation as applied to him. The Tiibingen hypothesis 
had for its main support an altogether exaggerated idea of 


1 See the notice of his statements respecting the Church at Corinth, and 
Clement’s Ep. to the Corinthians, in Eusebius, H. Εἰ, iv. 22. 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 503 


the influence obtained by such peculiarities of doctrine 
as appear in the spurious Clementine Homilies, These 
exhibit a particular type of that form of Ebionism 
which had been shaped under the Essene influence. That 
these singularities of opinion ever prevailed in the Roman 
Church, or in the churches generally, is not only a propo- 
sition devoid of proof, but it is contradicted by clear his- 
torical testimonies. Unconscious deviations from the Paul- 
ine doctrine, and ascetic elements, that manifest them- 
selves in the theology of the second century, imply no 
such ascendency of Ebionism. They are found in writers 
of that and the following centuries, by whom the name 
and works of Paul were held in the highest reverence. 

In the decade that precedes the siege of Jerusalem by 
Titus, the Christians, as we learn from the account of the 
Neronian persecution by Tacitus,’ had come to be recog- 
nized among the heathen as a sect distinct from the Jews; 
and so in Judea itself, as we have seen, with the growth of 
the fanaticism that blazed out in the war against Rome, the 
hostility of the Jews to the Church kept pace. The ten- 
dency of this persecution must have been to build up a wall 
between the Jewish Christians and their hostile country- 
men. It has already been suggested that the fall of the 
temple, with the capital, which crushed the hopes on which 
the Judaical spirit in the Chureh had fed, must have com- 
pelled many who were less obstinately wedded to the old 
ritual, to fall in with the more free type of Christianity 
which was now spreading over the Roman world. In) 
short, while the Jewish Christian branch of the Church | 
was shattered and divided, Gentile Christianity was taking 
root, and drawing multitudes within its fold. Hence, 
early in the second century, the churches are everywhere 
found to be free from bondage to Judaic observances, 


1 See below p. 529. 


504 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


and the Jewish type of Christianity remains only in the 
factions, one more tolerant, and the other rigid, which 
exist outside of the pale of Catholicism. 

From the writings of Clement of Alexandria, Irenzeus, 
Hippolytus, and Tertullian, we are able to gain an intelli- 
gent view of the Church Catholic as it existed towards the 
close of the second century.’ It is evident that the distinet 
conception of justification by faith alone, and the pro- 
found idea of faith, as these truths are set forth in the 
writings of Paul, are no longer vividly present in the 
Christian consciousness. Not that there is a conscious 
antagonism to this type of doctrine, but there has sprung 
up a certain legalism, a Christian legalism, to be sure, 
which involves a perceptible difference from the Pauline 
theology. It is a rash conclusion, however, which attri- 
butes this phase of doctrinal opinion to a Judaic influence, 
or to the effect of a compromise between two contrasted 
theologies. It must be remembered that the legal ten- 
deney may spring up, in any age, among those who accept, 
and sincerely profess to revere, the writings of Paul. It 
must not be forgotten that it is only two of the Epistles of 
Paul, that to the Romans and that to the Galatians, which 
present the doctrine of justification and of faith, with the 
sharp statement consequent upon the need of combating 
antagonistic errors; and that the other New Testament 
writings, besides those of Paul, were equally in the hands of 
the early Church. The Fathers, whom we have named, 


1 The term Catholic Church (ἡ καθολικὴ ἐκκλησία) first occurs in Igna- 
tius (ad Smyrn., viii.). It is found three times in the Martyrdom of Po- 
lycarp—first in the superscription, and then in ce. vii. and xix. Inc. 1x., 
however, it is only to the Church of Smyrna, collectively taken, that the 
epithet is applied. See, also, Shepherd of Hermas, iii. 17, where the uni- 
versal Church is referred to. Clement of Alexandria speaks of the “Ca- 
tholic Church” as antithetical to heretical sects. Strom., VII. xvii. (ed. 
Potter, p. 899). 


SEPARATION OF CHURCH FROM TEMPLE. 505 


and their contemporaries, so far as their theology varied 
from the teaching of Paul, were led into this deviation, not 
by any opposition to him, whose authority they had no 
thought of disputing, nor by the influence of Judaism. 
All the evidence on the subject points to one conclusion, 
viz., that the old Catholic Church, as it formed itself in 
the second century, grew out of that common Christianity 
which had honored alike all of the Apostles. This Church 
had its centres and strongholds in the Gentile communi- 
ties where Paul had been ihe principal teacher, and where 
his memory was reverently cherished. 


506 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER XVI. 
THE SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 


AT the outset of the history of the spread of Christianity 
by the labors of the Apostles, stands the event which forms 
at once the principal warrant and the principal element 
of their preaching,—the Resurrection of the Lord. The 
mode of this event, an event that passes the bounds of 
ordinary human experience, and is concerned with the 
mystery of life and death, can never be comprehended. 
The fact is attested on grounds equally strong with those 
which support the testimony of the Apostles respecting the 
whole life of Jesus. There are considerations which cor- 
roborate in a remarkable manner this part of their testi- 
mony. ‘That they, with one accord, proclaimed the fact of 
the Resurrection, and this from the very date of its alleged 
occurrence, is beyond doubt. Here, in agreement with the 
Gospels, Paul comes forward as an independent witness. 
In the year 58, he wrote from Ephesus his First Epistle to 
the Church at Corinth. It appears from this Letter that 
some Christians had called in question the doctrine of the 
resurrection, not the fact of the resurrection of Jesus, but 
the resurrection of believers generally. They may have 
been offended by a materialistic representation, which Paul 
makes it a part of his business to controvert, that the same 
flesh and blood that belongs to us on earth is to be revived 
and restored. However this may have been, Paul lays at 
the foundation of his reasoning the fact of the Resurrection 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 507 


of Jesus. He recalls the testimony which he had given 
them as to this central fact of the Christian faith.! He 
sets down in order a series of interviews of the risen 
Jesus with the Apostles and other Disciples; and this 
careful statement shows the importance which he at- 
tached to the proofs in question, and how strictly he had 
investigated them. He says that Christ died and was 
buried, and that on the third day afterwards, He rose 
from the dead; that He was seen by Peter, then by the 
Twelve—a general designation of the body of Apostles, 
although Judas was no longer of the number;—that He 
was then seen simultaneously by more than five hundred 
disciples, whether in Jerusalem or Galilee he does not say; 
then by James, by whom is meant, in all probability, the 
brother of Jesus; and again by the Apostles collectively. 
Last of all He was seen by Paul himself; the reference 
being, undoubtedly to his conversion. There is no reason 
to think that in either of these instances, not even in the 
appearance of Jesus to himself, the Apostle intends to de- 
scribe a vision, in distinction from an actual bodily ap- 
pearance. It is not a mental perception, but visual per- 
ception by the organ of sight, that the Apostle means to 
affirm. The statement that He was seen by five hun- 
dred at once is introduced as tending to show that there 
was no hallucination. It is safe to say that Paul learned 
these facts from the Apostles themselves. In A. D. 38, 
three years after his conversion, he had spent a fort- 
night with Peter at Jerusalem.” Other Apostles and 
immediate disciples of Jesus were known to him per- 
sonally. Nothing need be said on the question whether 
the Apostles affirmed the Resurrection of Jesus from the 
date of this supposed event. It is held. by considerate 
inquirers of all schools that their faith in the Resurrec- 


1 1 Cor. xy. 1, 3. 2 Gal. i. 18. 


508 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


tion was the fountain of all their zeal, the one chief 
source of their courage and activity.’ From this faith, 
as a prime condition, historical Christianity takes its 
start and derives its life. The psychological conditions 
of such a faith, if the fact to which it was attached is 
left out, are wanting. How could the Disciples, after 
the appalling scenes of the crucifixion, when they dis- 
persed and fled, and in the two days and nights that 
followed, “ when they mourned and wept” over the wreck 
of their hopes,’—how could they, in the midst of their de- 
spondency, imagine a Resurrection, and not only recover 
their courage, but find it augmented a thousand-fold? To 
say the least, the exalted anticipations required to counter- 
act the disappointment and sorrow which rolled heavily 
upon them, could only arise from the vivid recollection of 
His miraculous works while He had been with them, 
But if these miraculous works were real, then there is no 
antecedent improbability in the fact of His own Resurrec- 
tion.* The entire spiritual life of the disciples from that 


1See Baur, Gesch. d. drei ersten Jahrhh., pp 39,40. 7 Mark xvi. 10. 

5. Tt is true that it was popularly believed that a prophet might come 
back to the earth. John the Baptist was supposed by some to be Elijah. 
Jesus was taken for Elijah, or Jeremiah. or some other prophet, who 
had been restored to life. But in both cases there was a great objective 
phenomenon, the actual prophetic work of John, and ot Jesus, which 
found in this belief an explanation. Herod Antipas, under the excite- 
ment of remorse, thought that John the Baptist might have been raised 
from the dead, But it was the report of the miracles wrought by Jesus, 
an objective fact which demanded explanation, that suggested to his 
mind this solution. These instances of superstition, if such they are to 
be called, furnish no paraliel to the faith of the Disciples in the Resur- 
rection of Jesus. Nor does Matt, xxvii. 52, 53, whether the incident 
mentioned be considered to be subjective, or objective, militate, when 
the passage is rightly considered, against testimony such as the Evan- 
gelists and the Apostle Paul present respecting the great central fact on 
which their faith in Christ depended. See Neander, Leben Jesu, p. 
757 n. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 509 


epoch onward, their restored communion with the Lord, 
which had been broken by His death, their conception of 
Him as delivered from the limits of sense and space, and 
consequently the whole subsequent history of Christianity, 
presuppose the fact to which all these results are due. 

Of the character of the manifestations of Jesus after the 
Resurrection, two things are evident from the Gospel 
records. The first is that they were objectively real, being 
made to 80 many persons, on various occasions, and so 
tested by the eye, the ear, and the touch, that illusion is 
precluded. The second is that these manifestations were 
to the disciples alone. The capacity of the material or- 
ganism to be transformed into a perfect vehicle of the 
spirit, a deeper knowledge of the mysterious essence of 
matter and life might enable us to discern. It may be 
that in the interval from the morning when the risen Jesus 
first appeared to the Disciples, to the moment of His final 
separation from their sight, this change was in the process 
of fulfillment. 

What was the essence of the doctrine which the Apos- 
tles proclaimed in their preaching? In answering this 
question, much aid may be derived from the Epistles; yet 
it must not be forgotten that they were written not to 
make converts, but to edify converts already made. In 
the book of Acts, however, we have examples of addresses 
made to unbelievers. A distinction was necessarily made 
between the teaching directed to the Jews, and the appeals 
made to the heathen, who had not been prepared for Chris- 
tianity by a training under the Old Testament religion. 
The truth which, first of all, the Apostles uttered in the 
ears of their Jewish countrymen was that Jesus of Naza- 
reth is the Christ, or Messiah. They were called upon to 


‘ On this subject, see Matt. xvi. 16-18, John i. 49 50; iv. 25, 26, 29, 
89, xi. 26, 27, vi. 69, vii, 31, x, 24-26, xi. 24-26, xi. 27, 41, 42, 45, 47, 


510 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


believe in Him; that is, believe that He was in truth the 
Saviour and King whom the Prophets had predicted." 
Since the principal obstacle to faith was the fact of the cru- 
cifixion, it was necessary to show that the Prophets had 
foretold the sufferings and death of the Messiah.2 Thus 
the idea of a vicarious death on behalf of His people 
entered into the Apostolic doctrine respecting Christ, and 
found a sanction in His own teachings.> The positive 
proof that Jesus was the Messiah was mainly in His works, 
and the spirit in which they were wrought, and, more than 
all, in His Resurrection from the grave.* This was a great 
and conclusive attestation rendered by God Himself to the 
claims of Jesus. Thus the preaching of the Apostles re- 
solved itself, toa great extent, into the testimony which 
they had to give to facts respecting Jesus, which they had 
witnessed. But if Jesus was the Messiah, the rejection of 
Him, and the destruction of Him “by cruel hands,” 
revealed and enhanced the sin of the nation whose act it 
was. Hence the call to repentance was re-enforced by this 
new and overwhelming evidence of the necessity of it.’ 
And this call was attended with the added declaration that 
He who had been unjustly slain was to return to judge the 
world.® It is obvious that the faith in Jesus, which the 
Apostles called for as the condition of salvation, was an 
acknowledgment from the heart, and was sufficiently deep 
and sincere to move the believer openly to make profes- 
sion of his faith, to ally himself to the persecuted cause of 
Christ, and to submit to all the sacrifices which were in- 
48, xx. 30, 31, 1 John v. 1, Acts ii. 36, 41, viii. 12, 37, 1x. 20, 22, x. 42, 
43, xvii. 2-4, xviii. 4-6, 11, xviii. 27, 28. 

1 Acts v. 31. 

2 Acts iii. 18, 24, iv. 10, 33, viii. 28-35, xxvi. 22. 

3 Matt. xx. 28; xxvi. 38; John 1. 29, iii. 14, vi. 51, x. 11, xvii, 19. 

* Acts ii. 32, 33, 36; iii. 14, 26. 

5 Acts ii. 22, 23, 37, 38; iii. 14, 15, 17, 19. 6 Acts x. 42. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE, 511 


volved in such a step.’ It was impossible that this faith 
should not produce the greatest change in the general 
temper of heart. To believe in Christ was to own Him 
as the Lord and Guide. His precepts were accepted as 
the law of life. Especially did the love, which He had 
manifested even to enemies, in His own death, stand as the 
ideal of excellence. The forgiveness of sin, which the 
Apostles offered in His name, while it inspired the believ- 
er with gratitude to Heaven, was the most powerful in- 
centive to the cultivation of kind and charitable feelings 
towards mankind. 

When the Apostles went to the Gentiles, they could not 
build upon familiar Jewish conceptions. They must find 
or create an equivalent for them upon heathen ground. 
They had to lay a foundation in the natural intuitions 
and conscious necessities of the human soul, apart from all 
special revelation. They asserted monotheism, and affirmed 
that God is a Spirit ; and they were aided in this preliminary 
work by that growing tendency to monotheism in the 
heathen mind, which has been pointed out on preceding 
pages, and by the influence which the Jewish religion had 
exerted beyond the circle of its professed adherents. From 
the exalted attributes of God they inferred the folly and 
criminality of idolatrous worship.? The fact of sin and 
guilt, and the prospect of judgment, were more or less 
vividly recognized by the general conscience. Earnest dis- 
course upon righteousness, temperance, or the government 
of the appetites, and accountableness to God, awakened fear 
in the minds of profligate men.*? The fundamental ideas 
which made up the Jewish and Christian conception of the 
Messiah were capable of being made intelligible to the 
heathen mind. The story of Jesus and of the Resurrection 
might strike there a responsive chord. The doctrine of 


1 Acts viii. 37. 2 Acts xiv. 15, xvii. 25, 29. 5 Acts xxiv. 25. 


512 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the influence of the Holy Spirit seldom excited repugnance, 
or skepticism, among the heathen. The idea of a possible 
divine influence upon the human soul was already familiar 
to them. 


In the case of the Apostle Paul, we know that he varied 
his instruction according to the mental and moral condition 
of his hearers. The discourse which he delivered on Mars 
Hill was not repeated in every heathen town. In teaching 
the Corinthians, he had shunned all rhetorical decoration, 
and abstained from philosophical disquisition." He had 
made prominent the great facts of Christianity, a Re- 
deemer crucified, and His resurrection from the dead. He 
was careful to add, however, that beyond this rudi- 
mental teaching, there was a philosophy (σοφία), or the- 
ology, which was adapted to Christians more mature in the 
experience of the new life.? Yet this Christian philosophy 
differed from the Greek systems, first, as relating to the 
method of salvation through Christ, and secondly, as being 
spiritual,—as resting upon the illumination which is kindled 
in the mind by the Spirit of God? Of this higher range of 
teaching the Epistle to the Romans may be an example. 
Elsewhere, Paul recognizes the possibility of differing sys- 
tems of ethics and theology, which assume to rest upon 
the one foundation—Jesus Christ. Some of these super- 
structures are solid and enduring; others are unsubstan- 
tial, and will perish. But the authors of them, provided 
they do not seek to subvert the foundation, may hope to 
be saved.* 


The conception of the person of Christ, which formed 
itself in the minds of the Apostles, was the effect of that 
impression which he had made upon them by His entire 


1 1 Cor, ii. 1-6. UNO. rie AG om vbrmdl, 74, 
8 1 Cor. ii, 7-16. 41 Cor, ili, 11-16. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 513 


life, teaching, and miracles, and of specific declarations made 
by Himself. In the Synoptical Gospels, He stands above 
even the angelic creation, in a relation to God which 
involves the most intimate mutual knowledge.’ He is to 
judge the world, to appoint the lot of every individual in 
all the generations of mankind. In Paul and John—Paul 
as well as John—His pre-existence, and the Incarnation, 
are explicitly set forth.” 

In the writings of Paul, and in the Epistle to the 
Hebrews, the death and ascension of Jesus are shown to 
involve the catholic and spiritual character of His king- 
dom. No distinctions or prerogatives of a carnal nature 
can belong to 10. Believers are taken up into the fellow- 
ship of that celestial life which He now leads. The Apos- 
tle no longer knows “ Christ after the flesh ” (xara adpza), 
as the member of one nation, asa Hebrew.’ ‘The abolition 
of Judaic particularism, and the impartial freedom of the 
Christian brotherhood, is the legitimate consequence of the 
heavenly and glorified life that belongs to Jesus. Who 
can doubt that these views give the real import of the 
work of Christ, and were inspired by the same Spirit from 
whom the whole Christian revelation proceeds? 


The number of disciples, at the death of Christ, as we 
have seen from the Apostle Paul (1 Cor. xv. 6), exceeded 
five hundred; of whom there were about one hundred and 
twenty permanently resident at Jerusalem (Acts 1. 16). Of 
the subsequent history of most of the Apostles we have 
scanty knowledge. James, the brother of John, was put 


1 Matt. xxv. 31, Mark viii. 38, Luke ix. 26, Matt. xi. 27, Luke x. 22. 
On this subject see Dorner, Gesch. d. Lehre v. d. Person Christ., 1. p. 67 
seq. 

2 John i. 1-5, viii. 58, xvii. 5, 24, 1 Cor. viii. 6, Phil. ii. 6, 7, 2 Cor. 
viii. 9. 

3 Eph. ii. 13-20. 4 Phil. iii. 20. 52 Cor. vy. 16. 

ao 


514 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


to death by Herod Agrippa I , at the Passover in the year 
44, Another James, the son of Alpheus, one of the 
Twelve, still survived ; and a third James, the brother of 
Christ,’ comes forward, exercising the essential functions of 
an Apostle. The activity of Peter, as a missionary to the 
Jews, and in the guidance of the Jewish Christians, ex- 
tended over a wide sphere. In the conversion of his 
countrymen he had signal success (Gal. ii. 8). But of the 
particulars of his career, very little is known. In the year 
52 he is at Jerusalem, on the occasion of the Apostolic con- 
ference. Subsequently we find him at Antioch in conjunc- 
tion with Paul (Gal. ii. 11 seq ). His first Epistle is writ- 
ten from Babylon,’ which probably means, not Rome, the 
mystic Babylon of the Apocalypse, but the ancient city 
on the banks of the Euphrates. In that region Jews were 
very numerous, and it is natural that the leading Apostle 
to the Jews should be found among them. Whether he 
had visited the Christians of Asia Minor, to whom his 
Epistle is directed,’ is uncertain. It became an established 
tradition that he perished as a martyr at Rome. That he 
died as a martyr seems evident from John xxi. 18, 19. 
The first authority in support of the belief that he died 
at Rome, is Dionysius of Corinth, in an Epistle to the 
Romans, written about A. τ. 170, who says that Peter and 
Paul suffered martyrdom there at about the same time. 
Treneus (A. Ὁ. 176 or 177) refers to the preaching of both 
of these Apostles at Rome, without speaking of the mode 
and time of their death.® 

The Roman writer Caius® (about A. D. 200), and Ter- 
tullian’ state that Rome was the place of Peter’s martyr- 
dom. Much earlier than either of these writers, Clement 


See above, p. 424. 2 1 Peter νυ. 13. 3 1 Péter 
4’ Kuseb. ΗΠ. Εἰ ii. 25. 5 Ady. Heer., III. i. 1, ILI. iii. 2. 


5. Euseb. ii. 25, 7 De Preescript. Heret., ο, 36, 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 515 


of Rome,’ and even Ignatius,’ refer to the martyrdom 
of Peter, but de not speak of the place where it occurred. 
Since the tradition that he died at Rome antedates the 
hierarchical pretensions of the Roman See which are con- 
nected with Peter, and since there is no other tradition as 
to the mode or place of his death, the recollection of which 
would hardly die out, we may accept the martyrdom at 
Rome as a probable fact. 

Not far from the time of the death of Paul, as the 
events were ripening which brought on the Jewish War 
and the destruction of Jerusalem, the Apostle John took 
up his residence in Asia Minor, where he lived until near 
the close of the century, and was buried at Ephesus. ὅ 
John was not the only one of the Twelve who trans- 
ferred his abode to this region. Philip spent his last days 
at Hierapolis in Phrygia, and there, according to Poly- 
crates, Bishop of Ephesus (about A. D. 190), he died.‘ 

Among the uncertain traditions, must be placed the 
connection of Mark, the companion of Paul and Barnabas, 
and of Peter, with the founding of the Church at Alex- 
andria, and of Thomas with the establishment of ancient 
churches in India; although the tradition in both cases 
is less weakly supported than various other legends of 
Apostolic labors. ὅ 

Our information is most full as to the career of the 
Apostle to the Gentiles. There were many journeys, 
labors, and sufferings, however, in the course of his mis- 
sionary life, of which there is no record in the book of 


1 Epist. i. Ὁ: 5. 2 Ep. ad Rom., ο. 4. 

3 See above, p. 327 seq. 4 Euseb. H. E., v. 24. ef. iii. 31. 

δ For a summary of these traditions, see the Article of Lipsius, Acts 
of the Apostles (Apocryphal), in Smith’s Dictionary of Christian Biography. 
The legends respecting Thomas, as the Apostle of the East, are re- 
viewed in the recent work of W. Germann, Die Thomaschristen (1877) 
pp. 11-48, ; 


516 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Acts, but to which he refers in general terms in his own Epis- 
tles. The life of Paul illustrates the habit which belonged 
to the first preachers of the Gospel generally, of making the 
large cities the principal theatre of their efforts for the pro- 
mulgation of the new faith. In these, the synagogues not 
unfrequently opened their doors to the preachers of Jewish 
extraction, on their first arrival ; in the thronging popula- 
tion of cities, it was likely that there would be more minds 
prepared to lend a favoring ear to their message ; the obsta- 
cles from differences of language were less; and commercial 
intercourse facilitated the spread of the good seed that was 
scattered in the great marts of trade. It is an interesting, 
but not a surprising fact, that the circumstances of the 
first planting of Christianity in places which were later 
among its most powerful seats, including Rome and Car- 
thage, are not known. Visitors to Jerusalem at the great 
Festivals, mechanics who changed their abode from place 
to place, and commercial travellers, might carry to their 
homes the faith which they had elsewhere received, and 
form the nucleus of new Christian communities. The 
Gospel doctrine was transported from place to place, as 
seeds are blown from the trees and wafted abroad. 

The legends which connect Paul with the establishment 
of Christianity in Arabia, of which we have distinct traces 
after the beginning of the third century, rest on no better 
foundation than the probability that he would be neither 
idle nor unsuccessful during the interval that followed his 
conversion, prior to his return to Damascus. At Damas- 
cus his labors were of short continuance. Larger and 
more effective, we cannot doubt, were his efforts in his 
native city of Tarsus, the principal town of Cilicia, lying 
on a broad and fertile plain, upon the banks of the Cydnus ; 
“no mean city,” but the centre of a flourishing trade, and 
in the early period of the Empire, distinguished for its in- 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE, 517 


tellectual culture and its schools of philosophy.’ Antioch, 
the metropolis, in a sense, of Gentile Christianity, the mag- 
nificent and populous city which Seleucus Nicator had built 
upon the shores of the Orontes, about fifteen miles from the 
coast, the chief of the Greek cities in Syria in luxury 
and vice, as well as in numbers and wealth, was the 
head-quarters of the Apostle for a considerable period, 
and the point whence his missionary journeys radi- 
ated. The first of these journeys, undertaken (about 
A. D. 45), with Barnabas for a companion, and Mark, 
a cousin of Barnabas (Col. iv. 10), as an associate for 
a part of the way, carried the Apostle, first to Salamis 
on the eastern coast of Cyprus, and across that island to 
Paphos, where Sergius Paulus, the Proconsul, was con- 
verted, whose office and character are described by Luke 
with an accuracy which attests his knowledge and fidelity 
as an historian.” From Paphos, they sailed to Attalia, on 
the southern coast of Pamphylia, and near Perga; from 
Perga they moved northward to Antioch in Pisidia, and 
from there eastward as far as Lystra and Derbe in Lycao- 
nia. Thence, retracing their course, they came back to 

1 The determination of the date of Paul’s conversion depends upon 
the time fixed for the rule of Aretas over Damascus (2 Cor. xi. 32). But 
this last point cannot be ascertained with certainty. If, with Meyer 
and others, we suppose Paul’s escape from Damascus to have been in 
A. Ὁ. 38, his conversion took place A. Ὁ. 35 (Gal. i. 18), about four years 
after the crucifixion of Jesus (A. p. 951). His labors at Antioch proba- 
sly began A. ἡ. 43. The famine in the time of Claudius (Acts xi. 27, 
seq.) was in the next year (A. p. 44). Τὸ would appear, therefore, that 
immediately after his escape from Damascus and his first visit to Jeru- 
salem, when he was with Peter for a fortnight (Gal. i. 18), he spent 
several years in Apostolic work in Cilicia and Syria, making Tarsus the 
centre of operations. In this interval, probably, occurred most of the 
sufferings mentioned in 2 Cor. xi. 24-26—two scourgings by Roman 
authorities, five by Jewish, and three shipwrecks. See Howson’s Lifa 
of St. Paul, ii. 665. 

* Acts xiil. 6-13. See Howson’s Life of St. Paul, i. 176, 177. 


518 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Attalia, where they took ship directly for Antioch. This 
was the first great incursion of the Apostle into the do- 
main of heathenism, and occupied, it would seem, several 
years. It was followed very soon (A. D. 52) by his visit 
to Jerusalem, to attend the Apostolic Conference (Acts 
xv.; Gal. ii. 1). In his second missionary journey (A. Ὁ. 
52)—when he was accompanied by Silas, and joined by 
Timothy at Lystra—having revisited his converts in eastern 
Asia Minor, he passed through Galatia and Phrygia, still 
engaged in founding churches, and with the design, first 
of advancing through Mysia to the sea-coast, and then, 
when he was moved to give up this plan, of travelling 
northward into Bithynia. Prevented, likewise, by an in- 
ward monition from carrying out this intention, he came 
to Troas. There, as the effect of a vision, he resolved to 
cross over to Europe. Touching at Samothrace, he landed 
at Neapolis. Proceeding thence to Philippi, he planted 
a Church which was peculiarly devoted to him, and to 
which he was afterwards tenderly attached. Following 
he course of the great Roman road which connected the 
north of the A®gean with the capital of the Empire, he 
passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia to Thessalonica, 
the most important city in Macedonia, the metropolis of 
the Province, and a place which reaped a rich harvest 
both from its maritime commerce and its trade with the 
interior. After tarrying there for a while, he was driven, 
with Silas, to leave the town, on account of the hostility - 
of the Jews. Favorably received at Berea by both Jews 
and Greeks, he was, also, compelled by disturbances ex- 
cited through Jewish emissaries from Thessalonica, to de- 
part from that place. We next find him at Athens, a 
city whose chief treasure was now the recollection of its 
former glories; which had suffered from the vengeance 
of Sulla; whose walls were now leveled to the ground, but 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 519 


which was still renowned as a seat of art, letters, and phil- 
osophy, drawing pupils of distinction from Rome itself. 
The intellectual vivacity and restless curiosity of its people 
are pictured in the narrative by Luke of the Apostle’s 
visit. It was at Corinth, which he reached a. Ὁ. 53, that 
Paul sojourned for the longest time. Here occurred his 
interview with the Proconsul Galiio, the brother of the 
philosopher Seneca. From Corinth were written, it is pro- 
bable, his two Epistles to the Thessalonian converts, the 
one not long after the other, and the first not many months 
after his stay in Thessalonica. Corinth had been raised 
from its ruins by the magnanimity and wisdom of Julius 
Cesar, and was the chief city of Achaia. Its unrivalled 
advantages of situation, between two seas, had rapidly built 
up its fortunes, so that it was now a rich and populous, 
as well as a luxurious and dissolute city. The church 
which was founded here consisted mainly of Gentiles. 
At Corinth, Paul remained for about a year and a half. 
From the Isthmus he sailed to Ephesus; but making only 
a brief stay there, he resumed his voyage, and returned to 
Antioch by way of Czesarea and Jerusalem. Soon after (A. 
D. 55), he entered on his third great missionary journey. 
Taking the westward route, by land from Antioch, he tra- 
versed Asia Minor, going over “all the country of Galatia 
and Phrygia,’ and, proceeding thence to Ephesus, began 
his residence there, which was protracted, with occasional 
absences, for upwards of two years, (A. D. 56-58). Under 
the auspices of Augustus, Ephesus had risen from its 
decline, had become a great commercial mart, parallel 
in importance with Corinth, and was the capital of the 
province of Asia, a province that was said to include 
within its limits not less than five hundred cities. It was 
from Ephesus, probably, that he wrote the Epistle to the 
Galatians, and the First Epistle to the Corinthians ; while 


520 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


in Macedonia, after he had left Ephesus, he probably wrote, 
from Philippi, the Second Epistle to the same Church. 
After journeying as far to the West, perhaps, as the borders 
of Illyricum, he came down into Greece, and remained 
with the churches there three months. There he indited 
his Epistle to the Romans. Passing through Macedonia, he 
sailed from Philippi, and touching first at Troas, and then 
at Miletus, where he bade farewell to the elders of the 
Church of Ephesus, which had been to him the centre of 
prolonged labors and arduous conflicts, he pursued his 
voyage to Cesarea, and reached Jerusalem A.D. 59. 
Rescued from the mob of Jewish malignants, the Apostle 
remained for two years in the custody of the Roman procu- 
rators at Cesarea (A. D. 59-61), when his appeal to Cesar 
enabled him to fulfil his long cherished intention “to see 
Rome,” and to bear witness to the Gospel in the imperial 
city itself. After suffering shipwreck on the coast of Malta, 
he landed at Puteoli, where there were brethren to greet 
him; and at Appii Forum, and then at the Three Taverns, 
he was met by deputations of Christian disciples from Rome, 
who had doubtless been informed from Puteoli of his ap- 
proach. The Church at Rome had grown up, partly, it is 
probable, as the result of labors of converts of his own, and 
partly by other agencies. His Epistle, written three years 
before, indicates that it consisted partly of heathen converts, 
and partly of Jewish Christians. His Epistles which were 
written during this period of imprisonment, show that a 
Judaizing faction was not wanting to cavil at his teach- 
ing, and disparage his authority. Yet it appears that 
the Roman Church as a body regarded him with loyal 
sympathy. That church, gathered mostly from the ob- 
scure ranks of society, a majority of its members being, 
also, it is probable, Greeks, was no doubt numerous. 


1 See above, p. 492. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 521 


A portion of the catacombs, the earliest Christian burial- 
places, are known by their structure and style of dec- 
oration to belong to the first century. A passage of 
doubtful import in Suetonius adverts to tumults among 
the Jews, in which “Christus” was the ringleader.’ If 
there is reason to think that this is a confused report of 
disturbances among the Jews pertaining to Christus, or the 
Messiah, we still cannot be sure that the name and claims 
of Jesus were involved in these disputes. But the testi- 
mony of Tacitus, whom there is no sufficient reason for 
charging with a mistake here, proves that in the year 64, 
when the Neronian persecution broke out, the Christians 
formed a large body. 

The studied reserve of the Jewish elders whom Paul 
called to an interview with him soon after his arrival, or, 
what is less likely, their imperfect knowledge of a sect that 
had sprung up among their numerous countrymen in the 
midst of the vast city, explains the tone which they assumed 
(Acts xxviii. 21, 22). It is not impossible that among the 
Christian converts in the early days of the Roman Church 
there was, here and there, an individual of rank. Pompo- 
nia Greeina, a lady of distinction whose story is told by 
Tacitus,” has been thought by some to have been one of 
those charged (A. D. 57) with embracing ‘‘a foreign supersti- 
tion,’—a charge which implied the abandonment of the na- 
tional worship. She was tried, according to custom, by her 
husband, Plautius, in the presence of her kindred, and was 
acquitted. She lived to a great age, apparently in sorrow, 
and wearing “no habit but that of mourning.” This was 
attributed to grief for the fate of Julia, the daughter of 
Drusus, who was put to death by Messalina fourteen years 
before the accusation was brought. But this alone would 
not account for the charge of forsaking the Roman religion ; 


1 Claudius, xxy. 2 Annal. xiii. 32. 


522 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY 


and the supposition that she was a Christian, and that her 
mode of life grew out of her religious faith, is certainly 
quite probable. 

For two years (A. ἢ. 62-64) the Apostle remained under 
the surveillance of the Pretorian Guard. Though his 
wrist was bound by a coupling chain to the wrist of the 
soldier who was put with him to prevent his escape, he 
was yet permitted to dwell in his own hired rooms, to re- 
ceive all who wished to see him, and to prosecute his 
Apostolic work. Among the Preetorian regiments, from 
which his guards, who of course relieved one another, 
were drawn, and among the “ members of Czsar’s house- 
hold,” he won converts to the Christian faith. The 
“household of Czesar” embraced the numerous slaves 
and freedmen, among whom were many Jews, as well 
as Greeks, who were attached to the imperial family.’ 
The expression does not imply, therefore, that these con- 
verts were persons of distinction, although employment in 
the domestic service of the emperor, even in a menial capa- 
city, might confer privileges that would be prized. Several 
Roman men and women of high rank have been enrolled, 
on insufficient grounds, among the early believers in Chris- 
tianity. But, towards the close of the century, two names 
appear, which are known to be entitled to a place among 
them. Flavius Clemens, a cousin of Domitian, and a 
former consul, and his wife Flavia Domitilla, were accused 
of being Christians.? He was put to death, and his wife 
was banished. There is even reason to conclude that one 
of the early Christian burial places, the “cemetery of 
Domitilla,” the site of which has recently been discovered, 


1 See Friedliinder, i. 75-126 (4th ed.); Lightfoot, Philippians, p. 169 
seq. 

2 Suetonius, Domitian, xv., Dion Cass., Ixvii. 14, Eusebius, H. E., ii. 
20, ef. Lardner, Testimony of Ancient Heathens, cXXVU. iii., 6. VIII. iv., 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 525 


was on ground granted by this lady to her fellow be- 
lievers.* 

There is every reason to conclude that Paul’s preaching, 
even under the disadvantages that belonged to his situa- 
tion as a captive, was attended with marked success, His 
care for all his churches was not intermitted. At Rome, 
in this period, were written the Epistles to the Ephesians, 
to the Colossians, to the Philippians, and to Philemon. 
Of what followed this period in the life of Paul, we have 
no knowledge. Luke’s narrative implies, that at the expi- 
ration of two years some event of an important charac- 
ter occurred. The Pastoral Epistles—1st and 2d Timothy, 
and Titus—imply a release from the first imprisonment. 
A second imprisonment terminated in his martyrdom at 
Rome, in the year 67 or 68. It has been thought that in 
the interval between the two imprisonments, he not only 
visited Macedonia, and twice visited Asia Minor, but also 
made a journey to Spain. For the fact of a journey to 
Spain, the proof is chiefly derived from the expression of a 
wish or purpose on his part to go there, coupled with a 
passage of Clement of Rome where the Apostle is described 
as having carried the Gospel to the bounds of the West.? 

The world-wide activity of the Apostle Paul, extending 
through a period of thirty years, beginning at a time when 


Merivale, History of the Romans, vii. 126, Lightfoot, Philippians, p. 22. 
The charge of “Atheism” against Clement, united with that of living 
according to Jewish customs, proves him to have been a Christian. 
Suetonius calls him a man of “contemptible indolence” (contemtissimse 
inertiz). Charges of this sort were often made against Christians, owing 
to their partial withdrawal from social and public life. 

1 For an account of the investigations of de Rossi, on this point, see 
Lightfoot, Clement: an Appendiz, etc., p. 257 seq. 

2 Epist. ad. Cor., ο. 5 (ἐπὶ τὸ τέρμα τῆς δύσεως). The choice is be- 
tween the supposition that Clement puts himself in the place of his 
readers, and refers (rhetorically) to Rome, and the reference to Spain. 
Dr. Lightfoot adopts the latter interpretation, in his ed. of Clement, pp. 5, 6. 


524 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


he was in the full vigor of life, and not terminating until he 
had become “ Paul the aged,” was the prime means of es- 
tablishing the Christian religion in Europe, not to speak 
of the effect of his untiring labors in the whole region be- 
tween the Syrian capital and the coast of the AXgean. 

Being a Roman citizen, he suffered death, in all proba- 
bility, by decapitation ; and the sentence was executed, it 
is likely, outside of the gate upon the road leading to 
Ostia. The Apostle was ready to die; for what Cicero 
says of Cesar was true, in a far higher sense of the terms, 
of Paul: his soul glowed with the desire of immortality— 
‘semper immortalitatis amore flagravit.” ἢ 

The Neronian persecution makes an epoch in the early 
history of the progress of Christianity. Agrippina, the mo- 
ther of Nero, became, after the death of her first husband, 
the wife of Claudius. Bent upon gaining power for her- 
self and for her son, and having no scruple as to the means, 
she availed herself of the help of Locusta, a professional 
poisoner, and of Xenophon, the physician of the Emperor, 
to destroy him by poisons mixed in a dish of mushrooms, 
which he ate at the table, when she was present.? The 
preparations had been so made that Nero, then at the age 
of seventeen (A.D. 54), was saluted as Emperor by the 
Preetorian guards, to whom he was presented by Burrus, 
their leader, and by the Senate, to the exclusion of the 
younger Brittanicus, the son of Claudius by a former wife. 
With such a mother as Nero had, and considering the ener- 
vating luxury and moral pollution in which he was im- 
mersed from early childhood, it is probable that his tutor, 
the Philosopher Seneca, who knew how in his own conduct 
to abate something from the rigor of the Stoic precepts, did 
what was practicable to be done to curb the sensual and 
cruel nature of his pupil. Certain it is that as long as his 


1 Pro Marcello, ix. 2 Tacitus, Annal., xii. 66, 67. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 525 


influence and that of Burrus were predominant, Nero ab- 
stained from those excesses of violence and folly which have 
rendered his name infamous. The first five years of his 
reign—“the quinquennium”’—were, as a whole, honora- 
bly distinguished from the eight or nine years that followed. 
When, in the early days of his power, the warrant for the 
execution of a criminal was brought to him to sign, he re- 
gretted that he had ever learned to write, so averse did he 
profess to be to the shedding of blood.’ His guardians 
adroitly contrived to keep Agrippina back from actually 
sharing in the imperial honors and administration, to which 
she arrogantly aspired. He was betrothed to Octavia, his 
half-sister, but he made Acte, a Greek freed-woman, his 
mistress; and he was indulged in this matter by Seneca and 
Burrus, partly as a means of counteracting the pernicious 
influence of his mother. The first great crime of Nero was 
the murder of the innocent Brittanicus, whom he dreaded 
as one whom his enemies, and possibly his mother, might 
bring forward as a rival, and make the instrument of sup- 
planting him. Even in the early part of his reign, one of 
his amusements was to roam the streets at night, with boon 
companions, disguised, like himself, and to engage in frays 
with shop-keepers by endeavoring to snatch their goods. 
Montanus, a Senator, who, not knowing his rank, struck 
him in one of these excursions, and then recognized him, 
was ordered to kill himself. When he became enamored 
of a woman famous for her beauty, Poppa Sabina, her 
husband, Otho, was sent away to the government of Lusi- 
tania. alse accusations of unfaithfulness were made a pre- 
text for putting Octavia to death (A.D. 62). Poppeea be- 
came Nero’s wife, but she, too, was destined to perish from 
the effect of a brutal kick of her husband when she was 
with child (a. Ὁ. 65). Before this time, Agrippina, after 


1 Suetonius, Nero, x. 2 Tacitus, Annal., xiii. 25. 
? ? > 


526 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


various unsuccessful efforts had been made to destroy her, 
which were foiled by her vigilance, was despatched by the 
command of her son (A.D. 59). This was prior to Paul’s 
first arrival in Rome. Burrus, who was then still in power, 
was another victim of Nero's unbridled cruelty and jealousy. 
Seneca, at a later day, received the missive to die, which 
the tyrant so often sent to those of whom he would be rid, 
and which the Philosopher obeyed by opening his veins, ac- 
cording to the prevalent custom of the time. His age com- 
pelled him to accelerate the sluggish flow of his blood by a 
warm bath. Nero from childhood manifested a passion for 
singing, and for playing upon musical instruments. Had he 
been born in an inferior station, he would have acquired a 
moderate repute as an artist. Nothing delighted him so 
much as the applause so easily won for his musical perform- 
ances; and the care and culture of his naturally husky 
voice was in his eyes a matter of greater moment than the 
most serious affairs of state. His eagerness to figure as a 
charioteer led him, early in his reign, to construct a circus 
in his own gardens in the Vatican, where he could display 
his skill as a coachman to a throng of invited spectators. 
At length he came forward on the stage, in his own palace, 
as an actor in the new festival which he established under 
the name of the Juvenalia. This was the prelude to his 
appearance in the theatre before the populace, lyre in hand, 
to compete for their applause. Senators of highest rank, 
and matrons of noble descent, were induced, by his exam- 
ple and commands, to appear in public as dancers and 
play-actors. The theatre and circus more and more en- 
grossed his attention. He squandered the treasures that 
were gathered from the provinces, in expensive shows of 
this sort, and made in connection with them the most pro- 
fuse distribution of presents. 

On the 19th of July, a. Ὁ. 64, the ereat fire broke out 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 527 


at Rome, which gave occasion for the persecution of the 
Christians. It began in the neighborhood of the Circus, 
between the Palatine and Ceelian hills, and after raging for 
six days, it burst forth anew in a quarter which had escaped 
the first conflagration, and then spread with unabated fury 
for three days longer. Not less than one third of the city 
was laid in ashes. Some of the most venerable historic 
monuments, temples and shrines of the divinities, and count- 
less precious works of art, were swept away by the torrent of 
flame. Many lives were lost, and multitudes of survivors 
were rendered houseless and destitute of every thing. When 
the fire began, Nero was at Antium. When his own palace 
was threatened, he came to the city, and showed energy 
and zeal in providing places of temporary refuge for the 
people whose dwellings were consumed. Nero was himself 
suspected of having set the city on fire. The story was 
started that from the towers of his villa he sang from 
Homer, to the accompaniment of his own lyre, “ the Sack 
of Troy.” The conflagration had broken out, in the 
second instance, in the vicinity of the gardens of his crea- 
ture, Tigellinus. It was thought that the Emperor wished 
to rebuild the city in a nobler style, and even to call it 
by his own name; and, especially as religious edifices could 
not be demolished without sacrilege, that he resorted to 
this method of clearing the ground for his new erections. 
The subsequent extension of his own mansion, the Golden 
Palace, furnished an additional ground for giving credence 
to the charge. It is given as a fact by Suetonius, and 
mentioned more cautiously by Tacitus as a popular belief. 
It is, however, more commonly discredited by modern 
writers.’ Of this we are assured by Tacitus, that an anxiety 
to repel the imputation of being the author of all this 


1 See the arguments of H. Schiller, Gesch. d. rém, Kaiserreichs wnter 
d. Regierwng d. Nero, p, 432 seq. 


528 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


devastation was what led to Nero’s persecution of the 
Christians, on whom he sought to roll the burden of guilt 
which might otherwise rest on himself. Tacitus says :— 


“But not all the relief that could come from man, nor the bounties 
of the Prince, nor the atonements offered to the gods, relieved Nero from 
the infamy of being believed to have ordered the conflagration. There- 
fore, in order to suppress the rumor, he falsely charged with the guilt 
(subdidit reos), and punished with the most exquisite tortures, those 
persons who, hated for their crimes, were commonly called Christ- 
jans. The founder of that name, had been put to death by the Pro- 
curator, Pontius Pilate, in the reign of Tiberius; but the pernicious 
superstition, repressed for a time, broke out again, not only through 
Judea, the source of this evil, but in the city [of Rome] itself, whither 
all things vile and shameful flow from all quarters, and are encouraged. 
Accordingly, first, those were seized who confessed [that they were Chris- 
tians] ; next, on their information a vast multitude were convicted, not 
so much on the charge of making the conflagration, as of hating the hu- 
man race [odio humani generis]. And in their deaths they were made 
the subjects of sport, for they were covered with the hides of wild beasts, 
and worried to death by dogs, or nailed to crosses, or set fire to, and 
when day declined, were burned to serve for nocturnal lights. Nero 
had offered his own gardens for this exhibition, and also exhibited a 
game of the circus, sometimes mingling in the crowd in the dress of a 
charioteer, and sometimes standing in his chariot. Whence a feeling of 
compassion arose towards the sufferers, though guilty, because they 
seemed not to be cut off for the public good, but as victims to the fero- 
city of one man.” ἢ 


That Tacitus was not mistaken as to the class of persons 
who were thus tormented for the amusement of the popu- 
lace, that they were Christians and not Jews, cannot rea- 
sonably be doubted.* He was well acquainted with the 
distinction between Christians and Jews, and his language 
is explicit. Suetonius, also, tells us that the Christians were 
persecuted by Nero.* It may seem singular that Chris- 


' Annal,, xv. 44. 

5 It is questioned, without sufficient reason, by Gibbon, Ch. xvi. 

* Nero, 16. Afflicti suppliciis Christiani, genus hominum, supersti- 
tionis nove et maleficz. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 529 


tians, in distinction from Jews, should have been singled 
out by Nero when he looked about for objects on which to 
divert the wrath of the people, since the Jews were far 
more numerous and equally odious. This consideration 
has led to the conjecture that it was the Jews who made 
the false accusation against the Christians, either to save 
themselves from being the victims of the popular vengeance, 
or merely out of animosity against the sect which they de- 
tested.'| The orientals dwelt in large numbers in the 
quarter where the fire broke out, and suspicion might easily 
light upon them. But the conjecture which attributes the 
destruction of the Christians to false information emanating 
from the Jews rests upon no positive evidence. The Chris- 
tians had become numerous enough, as the language of 
Tacitus implies, even if there be some exaggeration in the 
“ingens multitudo,” to draw to themselves the attention 
of the Roman authorities. The epithets of reprobation 
which the Roman historians attached to the innocent suf- 
ferers are accounted for by the feeling with which they 
would naturally regard a sect that paid no homage to the 
Roman divinities, and renounced every national faith,— 
a sect composed, too, for the most part, of foreigners and 
obscure persons. But the terms employed by Tacitus and 
Suetonius suggest that the common charges which were 
brought by the heathen against the Christians, of im- 
morality and unnatural crimes, had reached their ears and 
were credulously accepted. The alleged misanthropy, or 
enmity to mankind, which made the people willing to see 
the Christians subjected to torment for offences which they 
had not committed, consisted in that separation from 
heathen worship, and heathen vices and amusements, 


‘ So, Merivale, History of the Romans, vi. 222; Von Reumont, Gesch. 
d. Stadt Rom., vol. i. See, also, Renan, L’ Antechrist, 159 seq., Schiller, 
Gesch. d. Nero, p. 436. 

94 


530 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


which formed a conspicuous and obnoxious characteristic 
of the disciples of the new faith. 

The page which we have cited from Tacitus lifts the 
veil, for a moment, upon the Church in the capital. For 
the first time Christianity is smitten by the strong hand of 
the Roman imperial power. Up to this time, persecution 
had been generally incited by Jews, in their anger against 
the apostles of what they considered a heresy. On vari- 
ous occasions, it was the Roman authorities who intervened 
for their protection, and for the preservation of order. 
Disputes between Christians and Jews had been looked 
upon by Roman officials with disdain as wrangles among 
factions of the same religion." But now the Christians 
stand out as a separate body, no longer protected by the 
egis which Roman feeling and Roman policy extended 
over the religion professed by a nation, and exposed, from 
the peculiarities of their faith, to a disgust and animosity 
such as other systems of worship could not in an equal 
degree evoke. How far the cruelty of Nero led to the 
persecution of Christians in the provinces, is a controverted 
point.? It was not until about the close of the century, in 
the reign of Trajan, that Christianity was formally placed 
under the ban of the law. The persecution of Domitian, 
like that of Nero, may be considered as springing from the 
selfishness and passion of an individual, rather than from 
the settled policy of the State. 

There is an allusion to the Neronian persecution in the 
oldest Christian writing after the Apostles, the Epistle of 
Clement of Rome to the Corinthians, which was written, 

1 E.g., see Acts xviii. 17, xxiii. 29, xxv. 18, 19. 

? That this persecution extended to the provinces is maintained by 
Ewald, Gesch. d. Volkes Israel, vi. 628 seq. This belief is favored by pas- 
sages in the Apocalypse. See, also, Renan, Antechrist, p. 183 seq. On 


the other side, see H. Schiller, Gesch. d. rim Kaiserreichs unter d. Re- 
gurung d. Nero, p. 436 seq. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 531 


there is good reason to believe, just at the close of Domi- 
tian’s reign, A.D. 96 or 97. The “sudden and repeated” 
outbreakings of persecution ' which the Roman Church 
had recently suffered when Clement wrote, suits the cha- 
racter of the persecution by Domitian ; and other internal 
proofs tend to confirm this conclusion.” After adverting 
to the heroes and martyrs of the Old Testament, Clement 
comes to those who are described as very near,’ belonging, 
he says, “to our generation,” * among whom he singles 
out the illustrious Apostles, Peter and Paul. With these 
he associates a “great multitude” of sufferers, contem- 
poraries of the Apostles.° The phrase corresponds ex- 
actly to the “ingens multitudo” of Tacitus. These he 
represents as having endured varied tortures. Women, 
feeble in body, endured steadfastly the most cruel tor- 
ments, and attained to the rewards of fidelity. His lan- 
guage is, “ Women, Danaids, and Dirce.”” What is meant 
by “Danaids and Dirce?” Dirce, in the myth, was tied 
toa bull, and dragged about until she was killed. The 
Danaids, the fifty sisters, were killed by Lynceeus, together 
with their father, and in Hades were compelled to pour wa- 
ter into a vessel full of holes. The enacting of mythologi- 
cal scenes in which the players underwent the fate of those 
whom they personated, was one of the barbarous entertain- 
ments of the amphitheatres.© That Christian women were 
thus made to enact the part of Dirce, and of the Danaids, 
and that to horrible events of this sort in the Neronian 
persecution Clement here refers, is one interpretation 

1 _—aigidviove καὶ ἐπαλλήλους. Clem. Epist. i. 

2 See the arguments and references of Prof. Lightfoot, The Epistle of 
Clement, Int., p. 4. 

8 τοὺς ἔγγιστα γενομένους (v.). 4 τῆς γενεᾶς ἡμῶν (γ.). 

56, vi. πολὺ πλῆθος. 

6 Interesting illustrative passages are given by Friedlinder, ii. 386 
seq. (ed. 3). 


Nora THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


of the passage.’ In this case those who were exhibit- 
ed as Danaids may have been slain by one who person- 
ated Lynceus, or they may have been forced to un- 
dergo different forms of torture which were described in 
the fables of Tartarus, until death put an end to their 
agony. Others, partly from the difficulty of conceiving 
of any role to be assigned to the Danaids, in a parody of 
the myth, which could satisfy the exigencies of the bloody 
arena, suppose an error in the text, and would leave out 
altogether the mythological allusion.? Whichever be the 
correct view, we have in this passage of Clement, in all 
probability, a distinct allusion to the terrible tragedy that 
followed the great fire at Rome, and in which a large 
number of Christians were the innocent victims. 

The thrill of horror which the persecution of Nero sent 
throughout the Church everywhere, is manifest in the 
Apocalypse, which was written soon afterwards. In the 
year 819 A. σ΄. 6. (A. D. 66), Nero carried out his deferred 
plan of visiting Greece. His great ambition was to win 
crowns in the games, and to figure as an artist and a char- 
ioteer in the presence of the multitudes who would be 
drawn together to witness the unwonted spectacle of a 
Roman emperor in the character of a singer and play-actor. 
The contests of Olympia, Nemea, Delphi, and Corinth, in 
violation of the time-honored arrangement, were all cele- 
brated during his stay in the country. He listened with 
rapture to the shouts of applause that greeted his perform- 
ances on the stage, and in the chariot races. His fond- 


1 This is adopted by Renan, J’ Antechrist, p. 169 seq. It is favored by 
Hefele, Patres Apostol., p. 62, n. 2. 

2 So Lightfoot, Clement, in loc.; also, Appendiz, p.408. Dr. Lightfoot 
would substitute in the text (in the room of Δαναΐδες καὶ Δίρκαι) νεάνιδες, 
maidioxat. Thus Clement would refer to “matrons, maidens, and slaye- 
girls,’ as suffering indignities and cruelties which ended in their 
death. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 533 


ness for the Greeks, however, did not prevent him from 
rifling the public and private edifices of their treasures of 
art. On his return, he entered Rome in the fashion of a 
conqueror, bearing the chaplets which he had received 
during his tour through Greece. But he had not long to 
live. Before he came back from Greece, C. Julius Vin- 
dex, Prefect in Farther Gaul, proposed to Galba, the old 
Roman commander in Spain, that they should revolt, and 
that Galba should be made emperor. The plot of Vindex 
was discovered, and Virginius, the commander in Lower 
Germany, marched against him. Virginius was ready to 
join Vindex, but the soldiers of Virginius attacked the 
troops of Vindex, and the latter hastily destroyed himself. 
This gave Nero only a short respite. Virginius and Galba 
conspired together to effect a revolution. Soon it became 
unsafe for Nero to remain in Rome. He fled at early 
dawn, on the 9th of June, A. D. 68, to the villa of his 
veedman Phaon, four miles from the city. Thither he was 
soon pursued by the soldiers who were sent to seize him; 
and just as they entered the house, he summoned courage 
enough, with the aid of the slave Epaphroditus, to slay 
himself with a sword. He was in the thirty-first year of 
his age, and his reign had continued for a little less than 
fourteen years. 

It was while Nero was in Greece that the announcement 
was made to him of a shameful disaster to the Roman 
arms in Judea. The reckless tyranny of the last of the 
Procurators, Gessius Florus, had at length provoked an 
open revolt." The governor of Syria, Cestius Gallus, led 
an army as far as the walls of Jerusalem (A. ἢ. 68); but 
despairing, with the force under his command, of reducing 
this almost impregnable city, he turned backward. At 
Bethlehem he was overtaken and attacked by the Jews 


' Josephus, Bell. Jud., II. xiy.—xviii. 


534 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


with such headlong bravery, that his defeat became a rout, 
and his war material fell into the hands of the assailants, 
to be used afterwards against their oppressors.!. Nero had 
in that region a valiant and competent general in the per- 
son of Corbulo; but him, out of jealousy of his power and 
influence, Nero summoned to Greece, and on the arrival of 
this commander at Cenchree, the port of Corinth, he was 
met with a message directing him to kill himself; a com- 
mand which he at once obeyed. As a leader of the forces 
in Palestine, Nero pitched upon Vespasian, a veteran sol- 
dier, and one whose advanced age, it was supposed, was a 
safeguard against schemes of ambition. 

We have referred to the transfer of the Apostle John’s 
abode to Asia Minor as pretty nearly coincident with the 
beginning of the great Jewish War. The Apostle Philip 
and his daughters, it has already been stated, came to 
Hierapolis. At least two other disciples of Jesus, John 
the Presbyter and Aristion,are known to have lived in this 
region. The references to the elders, immediate followers 
of Christ, which are made by Papias and by Ireneeus, sug- 
gest that when the Apostles, driven from Judea by the 
tumult that raged there, removed to Asia Minor, they were 
accompanied by a considerable number of their fellow- 
disciples. 

The date of the Apocalypse is capable of being almost 
exactly determined. When it was written, the temple at 
Jerusalem was still standing (xi. 1-14). It is, also, clear 
that Christians had endured bloody persecution at the 
hands of the heathen (vi. 9-11, cf. ver. 15). References 
are made to those who had been slain “for the word of 
God and for the testimony which they held.” In other 
passages, Rome, which is designated under the name of 
Babylon, is in particular made the author of sanguinary 


1 Josephus, Bell. Jud., 11. xix. 9. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 535 


persecution. She is drunk with the blood of the saints 
and martyrs (xvii. 6): in her is found “the blood of pro- 
phets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon earth ” 
(xviii. 24): she has destroyed “holy Apostles and Pro- 
phets” (ver. 20). That Rome is meant by “ the beast” is 
indicated by the mystic number (xiii. 18) which signifies 
Latinus (Aatetvoc). That the persecution described is that 
under Nero is shown by ch, xvii. 10. After saying that 
the “seven heads” of the beast are “seven mountains” 
—the hills on which Rome was built—tbe Seer proceeds : 
“And there are seven kings: five are fallen, and one is, 
and the other is not yet come; and when he cometh, he 
must continue a short space.” The book was written 
under the sixth of the Roman Emperors. The list of the 
Emperors is as follows: (1) Augustus, (2) Tiberius, (3) 
Caligula, (4) Claudius, (5) Nero, (6) Galba, (7) Otho, (8) 
Vitellius, (9) Vespasian, (10) Titus, (11) Domitian. The 
question arises, however, whether Galba, Otho, and Vitel- 
lius are included in the enumeration as made by the writer 
of the Apocalypse, or whether the space filled by them is 
considered an interregnum. That it might naturally be so 
considered is indicated in the language in which this in- 
terval is described by Suetonius.’ Galba attained to 
power in A.D. 68, and Vespasian became Emperor in 
A. D. 69; so that, as Jerusalem was captured in A. Ὁ. 70, 
the date of the composition of the Apocalypse is shut 
up within narrow limits. 


Upon Vespasian was devolved the hard task of conquer- 
ing the Jews. In the winter of a. p. 67, he gathered his 
army together in Antioch, while at the same time Titus 


1 Vespasian, i. Rebellione trium principum et cede incertum diu et 
quasi vagum imperium suscepit firmavitque tandem gens Flavia, Com- 
pare Diisterdieck, Offenb. Johann., p. 53. 


536 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


was sent to Alexandria to bring from there two legions.' 
From Antioch, Vespasian led his forces to Ptolemais, and 
there awaited the coming of Titus. Sepphoris, one of 
the most important places in Galilee, submitted of its own 
accord, and received a Roman garrison of 6000 men. 
When Vespasian began the campaign, his troops in the 
aggregate numbered 60,000. Josephus, the historian, who 
had been entrusted with the defence of Galilee, found him- 
self unable to withstand the Romans in the field, and the 
open country of Galilee was soon in their possession. The 
Romans then laid siege to the strongly fortified city of 
Jotapata, where Josephus commanded in person.’ After 
a most persevering resistance, in which the attacking force 
suffered severely, the place was taken. The inhabitants, 
with the exception of the women and infants, were put to 
the sword. The numerical statements of Josephus, neither 
here nor elsewhere, can be strictly depended on. He states 
that in the capture of the town, and in the conflicts prece- 
ding it, forty thousand Jews perished. In most of the 
places that were taken, always where there was a stubborn 
resistance, a general massacre followed. Josephus details 
the remarkable circumstances of his own escape from 
death, and explains the motives that led him to join the 
Romans in the war against his countrymen. According to 
the usual course of revolutions, the zealots were getting the 
management of every thing into their own hands. These 
were equally hostile to the moderate party of their own coun- 
trymen, and to the Romans; and the Jewish historian pro- 
fesses to have foreseen that the continuance of the struggle 
could only lead to the utter ruin of his nation. Vespasian, 
after giving his soldiers an interval of rest at Ceesarea, re- 
sumed the contest. Tiberias opened its gates to Titus, and 
the next great siege was before the walls of Tarichea, which 


1 Josephus, Bell. Jud. 111.1.8. Ὁ Josephus, Bell. Jud., 111. vii. 3seq. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APUSTOLIC AGE. 537 


was obliged to yield. The killed, according to Josephus, 
were 6500 in number; and the strangers in the city, 
having been sent to Tiberias, were gathered together in 
the circus there. Twelve hundred of the old and unser- 
viceable were ordered by Vespasian to be slain. Six thou- 
sand of the most robust of the youth were sent to Nero, to 
be employed in digging the canal which it was proposed 
to make across the Isthmus of Corinth. Of the remainder, 
amounting to 30,400, some were given to Agrippa, and the 
rest were sold as slaves.!. Gamala was next attacked. 
The Romans at length succeeded in entering the town, but 
were driven out by the fierce onset of its defenders. Reco- 
vering from this defeat, they rushed in again, and this time 
were victorious. During this siege, Mt. Tabor, which had 
been fortified, was also taken by a force detached for the 
purpose. In Gischala, John, one of the many leaders of 
the fanatical Zealots, had placed himself; but as he con- 
trived to withdraw with the forces attached to his person, 
the town was delivered up with the consent of the inhabi- 
tants. At the end of the year 67, all Galilee was subdued. 

The fanatical or popular party, the Zealots, demanded 
that the war should be under different control. They 
got the upper hand at Jerusalem so far as to wrest the 
high-priesthood from the hands of the aristocratic party. 
The city was thus torn by the strife of the two factions, the 
principal man of the moderate party being Ananus, and 
John of Gischala being the chief of the more violent fac- 
tion. Vespasian saw that it would be politic to let the 
parties in Jerusalem spend their energies in mutual con- 
flict. The Zealots reinforced themselves by admitting to 
the city fierce bands of Idumeans. The high-priest, Ana- 
nus, the main reliance of the party of order, was slain. 
The Idumeans finally separated from the Zealots, and pros- 


1 Josephus, Bell. Jud., III. x. 10. 


538 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


ecuted the business of robbery and murder on their own 
account. Vespasian, leaving this domestic strife to go on 
within the walls of Jerusalem, used his forces in conquer- 
ing Gadara, and afterwards, through one of his officers, 
Placidus, the whole of Perea. Later, he made a victori- 
ous march through Idumea, and laid siege to Jericho. 
The death of Nero and the political events that followed in 
rapid succession, delayed the beginning of the siege of Je- 
rusalem, for which Vespasian had prepared by previously 
subjugating, with an enormous destruction of life, the rest 
of the country. Another leader of the Zealots, Simon, a 
rival of John, after ravaging a portion of Judea, had been 
received into Jerusalem, and now divided power with 
John, both being in deadly hostility to each other. A 
third faction under Eleazar, a son of Simon, arose; and all 
three, each having possession of a certain district of the 
city, were in constant warfare with each other, so that 
Jerusalem was filled with confusion and carnage. 

In April A. p. 70, Titus began the memorable siege, of 
which the details are given so fully in the narrative of 
Josephus. The factions finally ceased to destroy each 
other, and united against the common enemy. But the 
bravery of the people could not hold out forever against 
the steady discipline and military skill of the Romans, 
aided as they were by terrible famine, and by outbreakings 
of mad dissension, within the walls. The fall of the city 
was attended, against the will of Titus, as Josephus as- 
sures us, with the conflagration of the temple. When the 
troops had grown weary of slaughter, Titus gave directions 
to kill only those found in arms. But they continued to 
slay the old and feeble. The tallest and most handsome 
of the youth the commander reserved for his triumph. 
Of the rest, those who were above seventeen years old were 
sent in chains to the works in Egypt, though a great many 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 539 


were distributed through the provinces to be destroyed in 
gladiatorial contests. ‘The whole number of prisoners in 
the course of the war is estimated by Josephus at 97,000 ; 
and he states that 1,100,000 perished during the siege. 
Although this last number is greatly exaggerated, yet if 
all reasonable deductions are made, there is no doubt that 
the destruction of life by famine, disease, the murderous 
spirit of faction, and the weapons of the Romans, was ap- 
palling. 

Josephus at the close of his account of the conflagration 
of the temple, an event that struck the stoutest hearts 
among the Jews with dismay, says of his countrymen: 
“What chiefly incited them to this war, was an ambiguous 
oracle that was found also in their sacred writings, how 
‘about that time one from their country should become go- 
vernor of the habitable earth.’ The Jews took this predic- 
tion to belong to themselves in particular, and many of the 
wise men were deceived in the interpretation of it.”* It was 
false ideals and fanatical beliefs respecting the Messiah, that 
impelled them to the contest which brought ruin upon them 
and upon their sanctu:.ry. Thus, strictly in the train of natu- 
ral causes, was fulfilled the judgment predicted in the words: 
“Behold your house is left unto you desolate!”? The de- 
struction of Jerusalem and of the Jewish nationality fol- 
lowed, in the line of cause and effect, upon the rejection of 
Jesus. But this catastrophe, by setting free the Church 
from the overshadowing influence of the Temple, left the 
Christian faith more free to move forward to the conquest 
of the Roman world. The conquerors of the Jews were 
themselves to bow to that faith in which the religion of 
the conquered survived in a purer form and with a new 
vitality. 

As a rule, the Roman government did not meddle with 

1B. J. VI. v. 4 2 Matt. xxiii. 38. 


540 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


the votaries of a religion as long as they were guilty of no 
excesses or irregularities offensive to the accepted standard 
of morals or subversive of order, and provided Roman 
citizens were not enticed to forsake the legal and ancestral 
forms of worship. But Christianity, as soon as its disci- 
ples were numerous enough to attract attention as a dis- 
tinct body, became obnoxious both to public opinion and 
to the laws. Christians were commonly styled Atheists. 
“ Away with the Atheists !”—the cry of the mob which 
demanded the death of Polycarp'—expressed the common 
idea concerning the sect which had no visible object of 
worship, and absented themselves from the temples, and 
all the public ceremonies of heathenism.? Wild notions 
respecting the character of the devotions practiced by 
Christians gained ready credence. It was said that they 
worshipped the Deity under the symbol of an ass’s head— 
a calumny which Tertullian charges upon Tacitus as its 
inventor.* Next to the imputation of Atheism and irre- 
ligion, the poor and obscure condition of the Christians, 
and the fact that the ignorant and vicious were invited to 
partake of the blessings of the Gospel, was a ground of re- 
proach. In the “ Peregrinus” of Lucian, they are said 
to have persuaded themselves that they are immortal, 
and to despise death, and to have been persuaded by 
their lawgiver that they are all brethren. Any cun- 
ning impostor, says Lucian, can grow rich by pretend- 
ing to be a Christian, and imposing on the credulity 
of these “weak and foolish men.” * Celsus who wrote 
about A. D. 180, embodies in his work against Chris- 
tianity the prejudices and objections that were current 
among the heathen. The record of miracles he ascribes ἴα 


1 Martyrdom of Polycarp,c.iii. ?See, 6. g., Justin, Apol. i. 6, 13. 
3 Tertullian, Apologet., 16. 
« ἰδιώταις ἀνθρώποις. Peregrin., 11 (ed. Iacobitz). 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 541 


fraud and credulity, and puts these phenomena on a level 
with the feats of magic to which he had given special 
attention. But the fact that the founders of Christianity 
and its disciples are of the lower class, that not phi- 
losophers and men of high standing, intellectually and 
morally, are appealed to, but that the ignorant and de- 
graded portion of society furnish recruits to the new sect,— 
this it is that excites against it the bitter animadversion of 
Celsus. This contrast between Christianity as a religion 
of the heart, accessible to all, and regarding with special 
compassion the poor man and the outcast, and the creeds of 
philosophy, which gave precedence to the ‘‘ wise and pru- 
dent,” and created an intellectual oligarchy, provoked a 
contemptuous estimate of the new faith on the part of those 
of whom Celsus is a representative. It is scarcely a matter 
of surprise that Christian societies, made up as at first they 
were, almost exclusively, from the humbler class, should be 
suspected of meeting for purposes of conviviality and de- 
bauchery, and that even rumors of hideous crimes, such as 
were often imputed to the Jews in the middle ages, should 
be propagated concerning them. 

Christianity might easily awaken suspicion in the minds 
of Roman officials, as a new faith, not to be identified with 
any other existing religion. The abstinence of its disci- 
ples from participation in the rites prescribed by law and 
custom, their refusal to make offerings to the genius of the 
emperor, and their habit of meeting together in private, 
might suggest to the government, which was keenly jeal- 
ous of all secret assemblies and clubs, that they were fo- 
menting some political scheme involving danger to the 
state. Their “obstinacy,” when they were arraigned, was 
taken as another evidence of disloyalty. Tertullian gives 
the two prime grounds of persecution on the part of the 
Roman authorities: “You do not worship the Gods,’ you 


542 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


say, ‘and you do not offer sacrifices for the emperors.’” 
“So we are accused of sacrilege and treason.”? ‘This is 
the chief ground of accusation against us—nay, it is the 
sum total of our offending.” * The rulers in the provinces 
were authorized to prohibit whatever might be con- 
sidered hazardous to order, or injurious to the safety 
and welfare of the community. It may have been in con- 
sequence of provincial prohibitions of this kind, that the 
younger Pliny, in the year 112, who was exercising pro- 
consular powers in Bithynia, undertook to punish those 
who were accused of being Christians, and wrote his famous 
letter to Trajan.? This correspondence between Pliny and 
his master opens to view for a moment the suffering 
and struggling church at the beginning of the second 
century, the fortunes of which are left in such ob- 
scurity by the silence of the classical writers, and by 
the extent to which the Christian writings of the period 
have perished. In that region, where Pliny was ruling, 
there were many of all ages and both sexes, and—not of 
the poor alone—but of every rank, who were charged with 
being disciples of Christ. The Christian faith had spread 
as “a contagion,” not only in the cities, but also in the 
country places; so that the temples had been almost de- 
serted, and the victims for sacrifice had attracted but few 
purchasers. 


In the dearth of precise information as to the rapid pro- 
gress of Christianity in the Roman Empire, the fact has 
been made a subject of speculation. Gibbon’s five causes 
are the zeal of the early Christians, which he represents to 
have been derived from the Jews, but to have been purged 


1 Sacrilegii et majestatis rei convenimur. Apologet., 10. 

2 Cf. Boissier’s Art., Les Premiéres persécutions de ? Eglise, in the Rev. 
d. deux Mondes, April 15, 1876. 

3 Plin., Epist. 97. 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 543 


of Jewish narrowness; the doctrine of a future life of re- 
wards and punishments; the power of working miracles, 
ascribed to the primitive church; the pure and austere 
morals of the Christians; and the union and discipline of 
the Christian republic—the ecclesiastical community. ! 

But, it has been pertinently remarked, Gibbon has not 
thought of accounting for the combination of these causes. 
“Tf they are ever so available for his purpose, still that 
availableness arises out of their coincidence, and out of 
what does that coincidence arise? Until this is explained, 
nothing is explained, and the question had better have 
been let alone. These presumed causes are quite distinct 
from each other, and, I say, the wonder is how they came 
together. How came a multitude of Gentiles to be in- 
fluenced with Jewish zeal? How came zealots to submit 
to a strict ecclesiastical régime? What connection has 
such a régime with the immortality of the soul? Why 
should immortality, a philosophical doctrine, lead to belief 
in miracles, which is a superstition of the vulgar? What 
tendency had miracles and magic to make men austerely 
virtuous? Lastly, what power had a code of virtue as 
calm and enlightened as that of Antoninus to generate a 
zeal as fierce as that of Maccabeus? Wonderful events 
before now have apparently been nothing but coincidences, 
certainly ; but they do not become less wonderful by cat- 
aloguing their constituent causes, unless we also show how 
these came to be constituent.” ? 

Another natural reflection is that Gibbon’s causes are 
separately the effects of Christianity, and, as such, are 
themselves to be accounted for. Whence the zeal of the 
first Christians? How could it be derived from the Jews, 
since most of the propagandists of the Gospel in the first 


1 Decline and Fall, ch. xv. 
* Dr. J. H. Newman, Grammar of Assent, pp. 445, 446, 


544 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


three centuries were of Gentile extraction? And if de- 
rived from the Jews, how did this zeal become purged of 
the bigotry and exclusiveness that had belonged to it? 
Whence the doctrine of the future life, as a living faith, 
in the midst of the skeptical Roman world? How came 
this doctrine, freed from the images of an immoral and 
superstitious fancy, to seize on the convictions of Christian 
believers? If the power to work miracles was sincerely 
claimed, what was the source of this real or imaginary 
power? How were the morals of the first Christians puri- 
fied, in the midst of the debasing influences that encircled 
them? And what gave coherence and unity to the or- 
ganized Christian society? Lying back of these agencies, 
to which the rapid spread of the Gospel is ascribed, there 
must be something else out of which they themselves 
spring. 

But, as Dr. Newman so clearly points out, these causes 
are not shown to be operative in the way and to the extent 
which Gibbon alleges. He means by zeal, the esprit de 
corps of the first Christians, or their party spirit. How 
does this operate to bring men into a society? The “old 
wine of Judaism, decanted into new Christian bottles” 
“ἐς would be too flat a stimulant, even if it admitted of such 
a transference.” How did the Christian doctrine of future 
punishment—for it is this which Gibbon has in mind, 
when he speaks of the doctrine of a future life—get cre- 
dence when “the belief in Styx and Tartarus was dying 
out?” How could the claim to work miracles make so 
strong an impression among those “who had plenty of 
portents of their own?” How could the virtues of the 
Christians attract those who did not love virtue, and who 
must practice the Christian virtues in the face of the rack 
and the wild beasts of the amphitheatre? How could the 
unity of organization in the Church draw in the world out- 


SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN APOSTOLIC AGE. 6545 


side, whatever power it might exert in holding those who 
had once entered within its pale?’ 

The statements of Gibbon undoubtedly suggest aspects 
of Christianity in which its power was manifested, and 
through which in part it won its conquests. But he leaves 
out what was the life and soul of the Christian religion 
and the secret of its power,—the thought of Christ, the 
image of Christ, the great object of love and hope, and the 
source of inspiration. The zeal was zeal for a person, and 
for a cause identified with Him; the belief in the future 
life sprang out of faith in Him who had died and risen 
again, and ascended to Heaven; the miraculous powers of 
the early disciples were consciously connected with the same 
source; the purification of morals, and the fraternal unity, 
which lay at the basis of ecclesiastical association, among the 
early Christians, were likewise the fruit of their relation to 
Christ, and their common love to Him. The victory of 
Christianity in the Roman world was the victory of Christ, 
who was lifted up that He might drawall men unto Him. 

When we cast about for the proximate causes, or auxil- 
iaries, in this wonderful historical change, which, in the 
course of three centuries, advanced an unimportant, de- 
spised sect to the throne of the Cesars, the one most 
worthy of notice is the powerful appeal which the new 
religion made everywhere to the poor and oppressed, and 
to all the multitudes for whom the world had little to offer 
in the way of joy or hope. From the outset, women re- 
cognized in the new religion a blessing for them, greater 
than had ever before seemed possible. The adaptedness 
of the Christian faith to all such, which was made a re- 
proach against it by supercilious antagonists, constitutes 
one of its chief glories, as it certainly was no small part of 
the means of its success. 


'Tbid., pp. 446, 447. 
35 


546 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


CHAPTER XVII. 


THE CHARACTERISTICS OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST 
CENTURY. 


THE first glimpse which is afforded us, in the Book of 
Acts, of the infant Church at Jerusalem, reveals the vigor 
of the new organific principle which united its members 
in one body, notwithstanding their continued recognition 
of the rites and obligations of the Old Covenant. It wore 
the semblance of a Jewish sect; and Jewish sects were not 
like modern non-conformists. They generally added pecu- 
liarities of doctrine and practice to the faith and worship 
which belonged to them in common with their country- 
men. Belief in Jesus as the Messiah was the inspiring 
creed of the new community which Luke describes. They 
still observed the regular hours prescribed by Jewish de- 
votion for daily prayer (Acts ii. 46). They had no thought 
of deserting the temple. And yet they consciously formed 
a brotherhood, united in the closest bond. Superadded to 
the prayers which they offered each day, in conjunction 
with the people generally, in the great Sanctuary of the 
nation, they met in their own place of assembly, or in a 
private house. There they joined in a common meal, which 
concluded with a solemn partaking of bread and wine,— 
the whole being a commemoration of the Last Supper of 
the Lord with His Disciples. This meal, accompanied 
with prayer and song, and which at a later day received 
the name of Agape, or Feast of Love, was the original 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 547 


method of celebrating the Lord’s Supper. It was one 
great family, gathering about a common table, and signify- 
ing by this means—so natural and familiar in all ages— 
their union with one another, and with the absent Head 
of the Household. The common meal of the Essenes 
was something analogous among the Jews. Among the 
Greeks, the banquets where the participants brought the 
provisions, or where they were bought from a common 
fund, and the sodalities or clubs, which ate together occa- 
sionally, and had arrangements for mutual help in distress, 
as by the loan of money, afforded some distant resemblance 
to the Feasts of Love which existed in the early churches 
wherever Christianity spread. Among the heathen con- 
verts, they took place towards night, at the usual time of 
the principal meal. They came to be held once a week, 
on the Lord’s day. The men and women sat at different 
tables. The repast was introduced by a prayer of blessing, 
and closed with a prayer of thanksgiving, or the Eucha- 
rist, from which the name of the Lord’s Supper was de- 
rived; the meal thus maintaining a likeness to the Last 
Supper of Jesus, and to the Passover. When the younger 
Pliny wrote his letter to Trajan respecting the Chris- 
tians in Bithynia (A. D. 112), the Communion still took 
place there late in the day, in connection with the Agape. 
Thirty or forty years afterwards, as we gather from Justin 
‘Martyr,' the separation had taken place; and while the 
Agape was late in the afternoon, the Eucharist was cele- 
brated in the morning. Occasional disorders which occurred 
in connection with the Feasts of Charity, would naturally 
lead to such a change; and the more a feeling of mysteri- 
ous sanctity associated itself with the distribution and re- 
ception of the Bread and Cup, the stronger the inclination 
naturally was to place the Holy Commemoration by itself, 


1 Apol. i. 66 seq. 


548 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


and to partake of the consecrated symbols of the body and 
blood of Jesus, apart from all other food. 

Tertullian, writing near the end of the second century, 
and replying to slanderous imputations from the side of 
the heathen, draws a picture of the Agape as it still ex- 
isted.' “Our Feast,” he says, “shows what it is by its 
name. The Greeks call it ‘Love.’ Whatever it costs, 
our outlay in the name of piety is gain, since with the 
good things of the Feast we benefit the needy. : 
If the object of our Feast be good, in the light of that 
object consider its further regulations. As it is an act of 
. religious service, it admits of nothing that is vulgar or in- 
decent. ‘The participants, before reclining, taste first of 
prayer to God. As much is eaten as satisfies the cravings 
of hunger; as much is drunk as befits the sober. They 
say ‘it is enough’,as those who remember that even during 
the night they have to worship God. They talk as those 
who are conscious that God is one of their auditors. [At 
the end of the Supper] after the washing of hands, and 
the bringing in of lights, each is asked to sing, as he is 
able, a hymn to God, either one from the Holy Scriptures, 
or one of his own composing,—a proof of the measure of 
our drinking. As the Feast commenced with prayer, so 
with prayer it is closed. We go from it, not like troops 
of mischief-doers, nor bands of roamers, nor to break out 
into licentious acts, but to have as much care of our 
modesty and chastity as if we had been at a school of vir- 
tue rather than a banquet.” Yet abuses such as Paul 
refers to as having occurred at Corinth, might be expected 
to arise occasionally in connection with such a meal, and 
among recent converts from heathenism. Other evils like- 
wise sprang up in the progress of time. Rich members of 
the Church, not without a spirit of ostentation, would pro- 


1 Apologet., ο. 39. 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 549 


vide the banquet for their poorer brethren. What was 
worse, when each brought his own contribution to the re- 
past, the wealthy would provide themselves with more choice 
food. As the reverence for ecclesiastics grew, the clergy 
would be served with special attention. All these circum- 
stances, combined with the provocation to scandal which 
assemblies of this kind, however innocent, could not fail to 
furnish to the heathen around, caused these Feasts, after 
a few centuries, to disappear altogether from among the 
usages of the Church. 

Another act illustrative of the close fraternal relation in 
which the members of the new community at Jerusalem 
were conscious of standing to each other, was the bringing 
together of their property into a common treasury (Acts 
ii. 44, 45). Men sold their possessions, and gave up the 
proceeds to be applied to the uses and necessities of the 
entire household. Regarded as a spontaneous outburst of 
brotherly affection, the fact is significant and impressive. 
But even at the outset, not only was the community of 
goods purely voluntary, but it did not carry with it the 
entire relinquishment of private property ; nor was it per- 
manent. The Church was a brotherhood; no other rela- 
tion so aptly distinguished the spirit of union and self-sac- 
rifice which it was designed should belong to it. At the 
same time, Christianity was not intended to supplant the 
family institution, but only to purify and hallow domestic 
life. The Family and the State were both to subsist, each 
set off by its own proper boundaries. The life of the 
Church did not require the destruction of either. The 
example of the first Christians at Jerusalem has furnished 
a model for monastic fraternities in different ages. It is 
copied essentially, when, at the same time that property 
remains the possession of the individual by whom it is 
legitimately acquired, it is held and used in an unselfish 


550 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


spirit, for the advancement of the kingdom of Christ, and 
for the benefit of His followers. 

The Apostles at first remained at Jerusalem, and super- 
intended the Church there. The precedence of the Jewish 
people in the new kingdom, and the hope that they were 
to be brought into it as a body, entered into the habitual 
feeling of the Christian society at Jerusalem. The death 
of Stephen, and afterwards the martyrdom of James, the 
brother of John, were, as we have seen, events of marked 
influence in stimulating the leaders to wider efforts among 
the Jewish brethren elsewhere. James, the brother of the 
Lord, now assumes a kind of superintendence over the 
Church in the metropolis, though his authority, such as it 
was, was probably in the main personal, rather than for- 
mally conferred, or explicitly defined. The first incident 
of particular moment in relation to the polity of the Jeru- 
salem Church, which Luke records, is the creation of the 
diaconate by the selection of seven persons to relieve the 
Apostles of the task of receiving and dispensing alms, to the 
end that they might devote themselves to their own great 
vocation, that of preaching the word (Acts vi. 1 seq.). The 
deacons were not to confine their services to the Greek- 
speaking Jewish Christians; nor can it be inferred from 
their Hellenic names that the new officers were all of this 
class. It has been announced by some without sufficient 
proof, that the seven, instead of being precursors of the 
deacons afterwards found in the churches, were in reality 
elders. That Luke gives no special account of the institu- 
tion of the eldership need occasion no surprise. The 
diaconate, as it existed in the Church at Jerusalem, was a 
new office, due to the exigencies of the young community, 
and bearing no strict analogy to any office previously 
belonging to the synagogue. Generally speaking, the 
polity of the churches was a free copy from the organiza- 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 551 


tion of the synagogue, with which the first Christians were 
familiar. The Apostles placed each of the churches 
which they founded under the superintendence of elders, 
whose places, as they became vacant, were to be filled 
by the act, at least with the concurrence, of the body 
of the church members.’ In all the larger churches, 
the churches in cities, there was a plural eldership; that 
is, there was a board of elders in each church. The eleva- 
tion of one of them to a precedence over his colleagues did 
not take place at the same time in all the churches, nor 
was it due everywhere to identical causes.? Within the 
covers of the New Testament, the terms ‘presbyter’ and 
‘bishop’ are synonymous. The former was the designa- 
tion of a ruler of the synagogue; the latter (ἐπέσχοπος) was 
applied to Athenian officers charged with the administra- 
tion of tributary cities. But this term, as well as ‘elder,’ 
had its Hebrew synonyms, and was not new to readers of 
the Septuagint version of the Scriptures. In the same 
way, ‘ecclesia,’ the usual term for church, was the familiar 
Greek translation of the Old Testament ‘congregation,’ 
or assembly of the people; having, therefore, Hebraic, as 
well as Hellenic, associations. The original parity of the 
ministry gave way to the early episcopate, which spread 
rapidly, and became universal in the first half of the second 
century. Ignatius of Antioch is the first writer who brings 
to light this change in ecclesiastical arrangements.’ In 
the Churches of Asia Minor when he wrote—a. D. 107 or 


1 Clem. Rom., ad Corinth., xlv. 

2 Respecting the rise of the Episcopate, there is, at the present day, 
a near approach to a consensus among scholars in the various Protestant 
Churches. A thoroughly learned and candid discussion of the whole 
subject is presented in Prof. J. B. Lightfoot’s Excursus on ‘the Chris- 
tian Ministry,” appended to his Commentary on the Philippians. 

3 We assume, as the more probable opinion, the genuineness of the Seven 
Greek Epistles in the Shorter Form. 


552 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


108—the bishop was above the presbyters; although it 
would be rash to affirm that the extravagant homage which 
this author is anxious to secure for bishops, was shared by 
any considerable number of his contemporaries. On the 
contrary, when Clement of Rome, at a somewhat earlier 
date (A. D. 96 or 97), wrote his Epistle to the Church of 
Corinth, the equality of the presbyters there still con- 
tinued.’ There is no implication that there was any de- 
parture on this point from the earlier method of polity, 
but decided evidence to the contrary. Polycarp, who 
wrote after Ignatius, and is himself generally styled Bishop 
of Smyrna, implies in his Epistle that at Philippi the 
presbyters were still co-equal. Clement of Alexandria, 
although the distinction of the bishop from the presbyters 
is implied, speaks, in various passages, in a manner to in- 
dicate that the two offices are essentially the same.?  Ire- 
nzeus, towards the end of the second century, and other later 
writers, also, frequently style the bishop a presbyter. 3 
Their language is not without traces of that primitive 
identity of the two offices, which is distinctly asserted by 
Jerome,* and, before him, by Hilary Ambrosiaster, ὅ and 
which the Apostolic writings exhibit. 

The change of the presbyterial into the episcopal arrange- 
ment took place naturally, in the circumstances in which 
the early churches were placed. The presidency of some 
one member in a body of persons who are to act together, 
arises almost of itself. The personal consideration of indi- 
viduals, from their relation to Apostles, or from their pecu- 
liar talents and moral worth, would not be without its 

"See δῇ 42, 44: ef. Lightfoot, Philippians, pp. 95, 96, and his ed. of 
Clement, pp. 128, 133, 137. 

” E. g. Strom, viii. 1: ef. Lightfoot, p. 224. 

$F. g. Ady. Her., III. ii. 2. 

* Bpist. Ixix.; ad. Tit., 1, 5. 

5 On Eph. iy. 11: ef. Lightfoot, p. 97. 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. Hos 


effect in promoting this change. The example contained 
in the superintendence exercised by James at Jerusalem— 
which the spurious Clementine writings magnify into an 
oversight over all the churches—might easily be followed. 
The presence of the Gnostic sectaries stimulated the 
churches in the second century to consolidate their organi- 
zation; and this would lead them to welcome the unifying 
agency of the Episcopate. It is not improbable that before 
the death of the Apostle John, it was established in the 
Asian churches which were within the circle of his special 
influence, and where the traces of an Episcopal constitution 
first appear. 

It should be borne in mind in all discussions of this 
topic that the early episcopacy was purely governmental. 
The sacerdotal conception of the ministry is not found in 
Ignatius, in Clement of Rome, or Clement of Alexandria, 
in Justin, or in Ireneus, or in any other ecclesiastical 
writer prior to Tertullian. Bishops were the custodians of 
order ; their functions were those of oversight and super- 
intendence. The notion that a priestly unction and a me- 
diatorial office, analogous to that of the hierarchy of the 
old covenant, belonged to the Christian ministry, is equally 
foreignto the Fathers of the first age and to the writers 
of the New Testament. The ministry were held to repre- 
sent the congregation of believers, and not to be distin- 
guished as a higher and separate order from them. They 
were inducted into the office by the old Jewish rite of the 
laying on of hands, which signified a consecration to some 
sacred work or use, and if the Holy Spirit was expected to 
be imparted to them, it was in response to the prayers 
offered in connection with the rite, and not as if a divine 
gift were conveyed by means of it, or a magical virtue 
imparted by the touch. Gradually in the church, ordina- 
tion came to be the peculiar prerogative of the bishop; but 


554 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


as late as the Council of Ancyra (A. D. 314), we find by the 
18th canon, that presbyters, with the bishop’s consent, may 
still ordain. In the great church of Alexandria, as we are 
told by Jerome,’ down to the middle of the third century, 
a vacancy in the episcopal office was filled by the twelve 
presbyters from their own number, who, it would appear, 
if he received any new consecration, themselves advanced 
him to the higher office—as, indeed, Hilary Ambrosiaster,? 
and Eutychius, Patriarch of Constantinople in the ninth 
century,® with independent sources of information, expressly 
state. 

Going back to the first institution of the eldership, we 
find that its primary function was that of oversight, or 
government. Elders were not chosen at first to teach. 
They might teach, indeed, but teaching was free in the 
Apostolic Church ; and their office at the outset imposed 
no such obligation. Nor was there a class of elders ex- 
plictly appointed to teach, and another class appointed to 
rule. Rather is it true that the office, originally de- 
signed, like the similar station in the synagogue, as an 
office of superintendence, took on the additional function 
of teaching, first as the result of a natural tendency, and 
of circumstances; and that finally, as we approach the 
close of the Apostolic age, an aptitude to teach comes to 
be counted one of its necessary attributes. 

In towns, where the number of Christians was con- 
siderable, the eldership, as we have said, was plural. The 
church “in the house” of one or another, was not a separ- 
ate organization, but simply a meeting-place of a fraction 
of the community of believers, who might, for want of a 
sufficiently spacious edifice, be compelled to hold their 


1 Epist. exlvi. ad Evang. 2 On Eph. iv. 12. 
> Annales I. p. 331 (Oxon. 1656). Cf. Lightfoot, p. 229, and Gieseler, 
Kirchengesch., I. p. 140, N. 2. 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 555 


worship in more than one apartment. But the churches 
in the Apostolic age were municipal in their boundaries. 
Nor was there any organic confederation of churches. Such 
arrangements were developed later, in connection with 
the synodal system. But in country places, a single elder 
presided over the church. The rural bishops, thus con- 
stituted, retained their independence of the neighboring 
city communities of Christians, for a considerable period ; 
until, at length, in the course of the third and fourth cen- 
turies, through the pressure of the confederative system, 
and the development of the hierarchy, they lost their in- 
dependence, and came, like the city presbyters, under the 
jurisdiction of the urban bishop. 

Evangelists, like Timothy, Titus, Silas, were assistants 
of Apostles, acting as their deputies in the promulgation 
of the Gospel, and in the organization of churches ; but 
the episcopal office, as it existed in the second century and 
later, had no genetic connection with this class of missiona- 
ries. The bishop, like the presbyters associated with him, 
was pastor of a local church, the church of a town, and he 
differed widely from a specially appointed class of itinerant 
Apostolic helpers. It is remarkable that in the oldest 
documents in which the primitive episcopal polity is brought 
to light, the Ignatian Epistles, the bishop is described as 
the successor of Christ, the presbyters being called the suc- 
cessors of the Apostles. } 

In point of fact, the churches in the Apostolic age, as 
we have said, were bounded by municipal limits. Apart 
from their common relation to Apostolic guidance, each of 
these communities was complete in itself. They were in 
communion with one another, and a rupture of this com- 
munion, through the act of one or more of the churches, 
except for a very grave cause, would have been considered 


1 Epist. ad. Trall., ii., iii. 


556 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


an unchristian proceeding. But the independence of the 
local or municipal church was not the result of an ordi- 
nance of the Apostles. It was not declared that this polity 
existed by divine right. Such a declaration, had it been 
made, would have prevented that development of confed- 
erate organization, which, whether for good or for evil, so 
quickly ensued. 

While the churches did not attempt to govern one an- 
other, they held themselves at liberty to address to one 
another words of counsel and rebuke, as well as of comfort 
in affliction. It was inevitable that churches should be 
regarded with different degrees of respect, that there should 
be more deference paid to opinions and admonitions of 
churches eminent on account of the number, or piety, or 
beneficence of their members, or on account of their situa- 
tion in places of importance. The Church at Jerusalem, 
up to the time of its dispersion in the Jewish war, had a 
moral preéminence. For a score of years that followed 
this epoch, an analogous rank appears to have been conceded 
to the Church at Ephesus. But all circumstances conspired 
to elevate the Church at Rome in the eyes or Christians 
everywhere. A moral ascendancy passes, with an insensible 
gradation, into actual authority. A newly discovered docu- 
ment—the concluding portion of the Epistle of Clement to the 
Corinthians—illustrates, in a very interesting manner, the 
nature and extent of that moral influence which the Roman 
Church, a few years prior to the end of the first century, 
by common consent exercised in relation to other churches. 
This Epistle is written in a friendly and fraternal spirit. 
Yet these words occur in it: ‘‘ Receive our counsel, and 
ye shall have no occasion of regret. For as God liveth, 
and the Lord Jesus Christ liveth, and the Holy Spirit, 
who are the faith and hope of the elect, so surely shall he 
who with lowliness of mind and constant in gentleness hath 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 557 


without regretfulness performed the ordinances and com- 
mandments that are given by God, be enrolled and have a 
name among the number of them that are saved through 
Jesus Christ, through whom is the glory unto Him forever 
and ever. Amen. But if certain persons should be dis- 
obedient unto the words spoken by him through us, let 
them understand that they will entangle themselves in no 
slight transgression and danger.”’! There was disturbance 
and contention in the Church at Corinth, and their breth- 
ren at Rome, from whom this letter emanates, are con- 
scious that their exhortations are from the Holy Spirit. It 
is not from arrogance, or from an assumed right to exercise 
rule over the Corinthian Christians, that they write in this 
tone. Nevertheless, we may perceive here the germ of 
those lofty pretensions of the Church of Rome, the growth 
of which, in its successive stages, it is part of the business 
of ecclesiastical history to describe. One marked feature 
of this Letter deserves attention.” Although written by 
Clement, his name nowhere appears in it. He writes as 
the organ of the church of which he is the pastor. It 
is this Church in its collective capacity, plurally desig- 
nated, which sends this appeal to their brethren at Corinth. 
This circumstance brings to mind the fact, of which it is 
one evidence, that it was the Church at Rome which gave 
importance to the bishop, and not the bishop who exalted 
the Church. 

As in the synagogue, so in the primitive churches, 
members who proved themselves unworthy, might be ex- 
pelled from the fellowship ; but this act, among Christians, 
according to the teaching of the Apostle Paul, was not 
merely a measure of self-defence against a contaminating 

1 δῇ 58, 59 (Prof. Lightfoot’s S. Clement of Rome, Appendix, pp. 375, 


376). 
2 Compare Lightfoot, p, 252 seq. 


558 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


influence, but, also,a means of reform to the offenders ; 
nor was the need of maintaining the reputation of the 
Church before the heathen forgotten. 

All offices, whether for the government or edification of 
the body, were considered as charisms—gifts of the Spirit. 
Persons who were designated by their peculiar natural 
powers, as quickened and directed by the Spirit, for the 
discharge of their functions, were appointed to fulfill them. 
Among the gifts of the Spirit was that of teaching. There 
was a class of persons who showed themselves specially 
adapted to speak in a moving and instructive way; and 
these were recognized as having a divine call to thig 
service. They were not elders, though, as we have re- 
marked above, elders might teach, and late in the Apos- 
tolic age, teaching came to be considered a necessary 
part of an elder’s work. But teaching, as we have al- 
ready said, was free in the Apostolic churches, in the 
sense that whoever felt himself impelled by an inward 
impulse to address his brethren, might do so at the proper 
time in the service. The gift of prophecy was not a fore- 
telling of future events, but rather a fervid outpouring of 
Christian truth, it might be in the form of exhortation. 
The “ teacher” expounded doctrine, in the exercise of re- 
flection, and as a fruit of the study of the Old Testament 
Scriptures; though under an illumination from above. 
The utterances of the “ prophets” were more improvised, 
and thus adapted to seize on the attention and thrill the 
mind, even of a pagan auditor who chanced to enter the 
Christian assemblies. The addresses of the “teacher”? were 
in the form of didactic instruction; those of the “ prophet” 
were hortatory, or at least predominantly emotional. These 
last might spring from an extravagant zeal, or enthusiasm, 
and contain an admixture of hurtful error. Hence there 
were persons competent to discern spirits, or to discrimi- 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 559 


nate between what should be considered divine truth, and 
what should be rejected. The “speaking with tongues,” 
which the Apostle Paul describes, appears to have been an 
outpouring of prayer in broken ejaculations and incoherent 
cries, when the mind, surcharged with emotion, was thrown 
into an ecstasy, so that “interpreters,” possessed of a special 
gift, were required to convert these glowing exclamatory ut- 
terances into an intelligible form.’ Besides these gifts, there 


1 The principal passages in the New Testament which refer to speak- 
ing with tongues are Mark xvi. 17 (which, however, does not belong in 
the original text), Acts ii, 1-13, x. 46, xix. 6, 1 Cor. xii., xiv. The re- 
ferences of Paul appear to be, not to a speaking in foreign languages, but 
to an ecstatic outburst of prayer and praise, in which the soul is swept on 
by a spiritual impulse, the ordinary exercise of invention and reflection 
being suspended. In Acts x. 46, xix. 6, a similar phenomenon would 
seem to be designated. The “speaking with tongues,” in Acts ii. 1-13, 
was also an ecstatic outpouring of speech, “as the Spirit gave them ut- 
terance” (ver. 4). The strange and impassioned fervor of those who 
thus spoke, led some to say that they had drunk wine to excess (ver. 19). 
There is nothing to imply that a permanent knowledge of foreign lan- 
guages was given to the early disciples. Peter’s address (vers. 14-37) 
was in his ordinary dialect. The speaking with tongues, whatever it 
signifies, which preceded this address, was devotional, not didactic. 
There is no evidence in the Apostolic history that the preachers of the 
Gospel prosecuted their labors with the aid of such miraculous know- 
ledge. The early Apologists do not refer to its existence. Whether 
Irenzus, in his reference to this subject (adv. Her., V. vi. 1), means to 
denote speaking in different dialects, or only that ecstatic utterance of 
prayer which has been described, is not clear from his language. It is 
the latter, probably, to which Tertullian refers (adv. Marcion., v. 8). 
Nevertheless, a fair exegesis of Acts ii. 1-13 must allow that Luke here 
intends to describe a speaking in various languages; and such is the 
more natural interpretation of Mark xvi. 17. It follows either that the 
tradition which Luke followed had misinterpreted in this particular the 
phenomenon of the Pentecost—which is the opinion of Neander (Plant. 
and Train. of the Church, pp. 16, 17, ed. Robinson), and of Meyer (Apos- 
telgeschichte, pp. 53, 54); or that the phenomenon to which Luke refers 
in Acts 11. was peculiar, and different from that which is discussed by 
Paul, and which was common in the Apostolic churches. This last opi- 
nion is defended by Dr. Schaff (Hist. of the Apostolic Church, p. 201 seq.). 


560 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


were gifts of miracles, including the power to heal diseases 
without the intervention of the ordinary means of cure. 
Illustrations of the exercise of these powers are presented 
in the book of Acts; but they were not specially called 
into activity in the assemblies for worship. Thus, in the 
Apostolic church, all the functions of government, as well 
as of teaching, were in the hands of those who were con- 
scious of acting as the organs of a Power above themselves, 
by whom they were singled out, each of them for his par- 
ticular work. It was a community lifted up to this high 
pitch of earnestness. It was, to use the Apostle’s simile, a 
body, every member of which served every other, and was 
served in turn by all. If the Christian meeting, gathered 
in some private house which afforded sufficient accommo- 
dation to the worshippers, bore a resemblance to the syna- 
gogue, it was the synagogue on fire with an ardor never 
witnessed in the Jewish assemblies. 


Where the spontaneous element was thus powerful, there 
was all the more need of regulation. There was an order 
of service, modelled, in a general way, on that of the syna- 
gogue; yet so that room should be left for free utterance on 
the part of individuals, as feeling might prompt. It is pro- 
bable that, in the life-time of the Apostles, the Scriptures of 
the Old Testament were read, in consecutive extracts, and 
that thus early the reading was attended by an exposition 
and application of the passage by him who conducted the 
worship. This was a copy of the synagogue practice. 
Later, the reading of the Gospels, also, was introduced, and, 
later still, the Apostolic Epistles were connected with the 
other Scriptures in this public use. There were prayers to 


The different theories—including that of Bleek, who supposes that the 
speaking with tongues was the exclamatory utterance, under high- 
wrought excitement, of mystic, figurative words, some of which were 
foreign—are reviewed by Meyer. 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 561 


which the people responded “Amen,” and the singing of 
Psalms and Hymns. Not only were there extemporaneous 
prayers, but also effusions of song, on the part of indivi- 
duals, and the exercise of the various gifts of the Spirit. 
The Apostle Paul found it necessary to discourage the 
“speaking with tongues,” and like ebullitions of high- 
wrought feeling, which, if not restrained, might pass the 
bounds of sobriety. He discountenanced the speaking of 
women, which offended the ancient feeling of decorum, and 
might thus bring Christians into ill repute among the 
heathen. He likewise judged it a transgression of the 
sphere allotted in the divine order to females. 

Among Jewish Christians, the observance of the weekly 
sabbath, and of the annual festivals which were appointed 
in the Mosaic Law, of course continued. In the Gentile 
churches this was not the case. Where the community was 
predominantly made up of Jews, the old observances might 
remain. But the Apostle Paul resisted the introduction of 
the Old Testament festivals, including the sabbath, into 
the churches which he had planted; declaring that by the 
adoption of them the Gentile believer forfeited the benefits 
of the Gospel, since he chose to rest his salvation upon rites, 
instead of upon Christ.!. There is to be found in the New 
Testament no explicit appointment of the first day of the 
week as a day of Christian worship. Much less is there, 
either in the New Testament or in the ecclesiastical writers 
of the first centuries, any statement to the effect that the 
Christian institution was the Old Testament Sabbath en- 
joined in the decalogue, the first day being substituted for 
the seventh. Nevertheless, there are traces of the spe. 
cial religious commemoration of Sunday, the day of the 
Saviour’s resurrection, in several passages of the New Tes- 


1 See Col. ii. 16, where the annual, monthly, and weekly festivals of 
the Jews are specified. Cf. Gal. iy. 10, Rom. xiv. 5, 6. 
36 


562 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


tament.' It is called the Lord’s Day, in the book of Reve- 
lation. It is an observance that sprang up under the eye 
of the Apostles, and with their approval; at the same time 
that it was a spontaneous product of Christian feeling. On 
that day the early Christians joined in acts of joyful wor- 
ship, and set apart their gifts for the poor. In churches 
composed of Jewish Christians, this consecration of the first 
day was associated with the continued observance of the 
Sabbath ; which could not have been the case had there 
been a substitution, by an explicit ordinance, of the first 
day for the seventh. 

Of the existence of yearly Christian festivals, there is no 
notice in the New Testament writings. That such festi- 
vals, with the exception of Easter, existed in the Apostolic 
age is not pretended. In the Paschal controversies of the 
second century, in which the churches of Asia Minor were 
opposed to churches elsewhere, the authority of the Apostle 
John was appealed to in support of the Asiatic observance. 
It would be extremely natural, certainly, wherever Jewish 
Christians were found, at the recurrence of the Passover 
season, to bring to mind the Saviour’s death and _ resurrec- 
tion; and to signalize this anniversary by some appropri- 
ate commemoration. This consideration, in connection 
with the fact just stated, and with the known fact of the 
wide-spread celebration of Easter in the second century, 
may lend support to the opinion that the beginnings of this 
Festival were prior to the death of John. 

The celebrated letter, to which we have referred, writ- 
ten to Trajan about Α. Ὁ. 112 by the younger Pliny, from 
Bithynia, where he was exercising proconsular powers un- 
der the Emperor, throws light upon the method of wor- 
ship in the early church. “They affirmed,” he says of 
those whom he examined, “that the whole of their fault, 


τ Acts xx, 7, 1Cor, xvi. ἢ, 2 Bev. i. 10 2 Hpistt., x. 97. 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 563 


or error, lay in this,—that they were wont to meet together 
on a stated day before it was light, and sing among them- 
selves alternately (invicem) a hymn to Christ as a god 
(quasi Deo), and to bind themselves by an oath, not to the 
commission of any wickedness, but that they would not be 
guilty of theft, or robbery, or adultery, would not falsify 
their word, nor refuse to return a pledge committed to 
them, when called upon todo so. When these things were 
performed, they said that it was their custom to separate, 
and then to come together again to a meal, which they ate 
in common, but without any disorder.” The “ stated 
day” on which the Christians assembled for worship, it is 
scarcely possible to doubt, was Sunday. Their religious 
service in this region was at a very early hour, before the 
dawn of day. The alternate singing of a hymn to Christ 
may be a loose and inexact description of the devotional 
service in which the people responded “ Amen ;” with 
which, however, singing was connected. And it is not 
needful to suppose that a formal engagement, such as is 
described, was made every week to abstain from the vices 
named. It is a description of the vows, which the Chris- 
tians publicly assumed, to avoid the various forms of sin. 
The common meal to which reference is made was the 
Agape, or Feast of Love, which was celebrated near the 
close of the day, and with which, as we have stated above, 
the Lord’s Supper was at that time still connected. 

With this passage may be associated the statements of 
Justin, in the First Apology, written between A. p. 149 
and 150: ‘*On the day which is called Sunday, there is 
an assembly in the same place of all who live in cities, 
or in country districts; and the records of the Apostles 
[the Gospels], or the writings of the Prophets are read as 
long as we have time. Then the reader concludes; and 
the President verbally instructs and exhorts us, to the imi- 


564 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


tation of these excellent things: then we all together rise 
and offer up our prayers; and, as I said before, when we 
have concluded our prayer, bread is brought, and wine 
and water; and the President, in like manner, offers up 
prayers and thanksgivings with all his strength; and the 
people give their assent by saying ‘Amen;’ and there is 
a distribution and partaking by every one, of the Eucha- 
ristic elements ; and to those who are not present, they are 
sent by the hands of the deacons; and such as are in pros- 
perous circumstances, and wish to do so, give what they 
will, each according to his choice ; and what is collected is 
placed in the hands of the President, who assists the 
orphans and widows, and such as through sickness, or any 
other cause, are in want; and to those who are in bonds, 
and to strangers from afar, and, in a word, to all who are 
in need, he is a protector.”* Here we have a mention of 
the reading of the Scriptures of the Old Testament, and of 
the Gospels, which had come to be connected with it, and a 
reference to the practical exposition and hortation, which 
followed, and constituted the sermon. ‘The prayers, with 
the responsive ‘Amen’ from the congregation, are next in 
the order. These are succeeded by the Eucharist, which is 
now disconnected from the Agape. The bread and wine, 
the latter being mingled with water, according to the Jew- 
ish practice, are partaken of by all, and are sent by the 
deacons to those who are detained at their homes. The 
collection of alms to be distributed to those in need, of 
every class, is a prominent part of divine service. Sunday 
is celebrated, Justin adds, as the first day on which God, 
when He changed the darkness and matter, made the 
world, and as the day of the Resurrection of Christ. In 
the room of the Jewish Sabbath, he elsewhere says,” “ the 
new law commands a perpetual Sabbath.” 


1 Apol. i. 67. 2 Dial. c. Tryph., 12. 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 565 


The principal rites in the early Church were Baptism 
and the Lord’s supper. Baptism, it is now generally 
agreed among scholars, was commonly by immersion." 
Whether infants were baptized in the Apostolic age, or ex- 
actly when the custom arose of administering this rite to 
them, is a controverted question on which the New Testa- 
ment writings furnish no direct information. The mention 
of the baptism of households is not entirely conclusive, since 
we are not certain that infant children were contained in 
them ; and, besides, if it were known that infants were not 
baptized, they would be understood to be excepted in a gen- 
eral statement of this sort respecting a household. In pro- 
portion as the Christian Church felt itself a distinct com- 
munity, parted from the world of heathenism, the more 
naturally would this practice take root. Within the pale 
of the holy community the children of its members would 
be felt to be embraced.? Irenzeus—who was born about A. 
τ. 1830—implies that infants were baptized in his time. 
Origen, a child of Christian parents, and born A. Ὁ. 155, 
was baptized in infancy, and regarded infant baptism as an 


1 See on this subject, Justin Martyr, Apol. i. 61. (cf. Prof. Stuart, 
Bibl. Repos., 1833, p. 356); Tertullian, de Baptismo, passim, de Corona, 
3; Cyprian, Ep. lxxv.; Chrysostom, Hom. xi. See, also, Calvin, Institutt. 
IV. xv.19; Luther, de Sacram. Baptismi, Oper. Luth. 1564, i. 319. 
Bingham, Antiquities, 1. 309; Wetzer u. Welte, Kirchen-Lexicon (Roman 
Cath.), x. 673 (Art. Taufe}; Herzog, Real-Encyel., xv. 474 (Art. Taufe) ; 
Smith’s Bible Dict. (Am. ed.) i. 14 (Art. Baptism); Smith’s Dict. of 
Christ. Antiquities, i. 161, 3 49 (cf. p. 168 33 92, 93); Conybeare and 
Howson, Life of St. Paul, i. 439, ii. 169; Stanley’s Kastern Church, p. 
117; Wall, History of Infant Baptism, ii. 327, 328; Mosheim, Ch. Hist., 
i. 87; Neander, Plant. and Train. of the Ch., (Am. ed.) p. 161, Ch. Hist., 
i. 310; Blunt, Dict. of Doct. and Hist. Theology, p.75 (Art. Baptism) ; 
Schaff, Hist. Apostol. Ch., p. 570, Ch. Hist., i. 128. See, also, Meyer, 
Komm. tiber das N. T. (Mark i. 9, vii. 4, cf. Luke xi. 38); Bleek, Synopt. 
Erkl. d. drei ersten Evangg. (Mark i. 9); Winer, N. T. Grammar 
(Thayer’s ed.), p. 412. 

7 1 Cor. vii. 14. 


566 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Apostolic institution." It sprang up early, and spread ex- 
tensively, because it was regarded as consonant with Chris- 
tian ideas, and with the proper conception of the Church. 
At the outset, the candidate for admission to the Church 
was baptized simply in the name of Christ. Later, the 
more extended baptismal formula came into general use. 
The one article of Faith at the beginning, the sole condi- 
tion of acceptance to membership, was faith in Jesus as the 
Messiah. A more formal or extended creed did not exist. 
Baptism, according to the description of Justin, was pre- 
ceded by prayer and fasting on the part of the candidate and 
of the people with him.? After the rite had been adminis- 
tered, they gathered in an assembly for common prayer. 
Then they saluted one another with a kiss; and the service 
concluded with the administration of the Communion— 
prayers and thanksgivings, to which the congregation re- 
sponded ‘“‘ Amen,” forming a part of this service. 


With respect to the use of written forms of prayer in 
the worship of the early Christians, apart from the syna- 
gogue service, there is such a controversy as usually arises 
where the data necessary to an undoubting judgment are 
absent. It is agreed that, in the Apostolic age, extempo- 
raneous prayer was in use in the churches. “ Whilst the 
extraordinary gifts of the Spirit continued,” says Bing- 
ham, “there is little doubt to be made but that prayers and 
hymns, immediately dictated by the Spirit, made up a part 


1 Treneus, Adv. Her., 11. xxii. 4 (“qui per eum renascuntur in Deum”) : 
on the sense of ‘‘renascuntur,” see Neander, Ch. Hist. i. 311. Origen, 
Comm. in Epist. ad Rom., in the Latin Transl. (‘ecclesia ab apostolis 
traditionem suscepit, etiam parvulis baptismam dare’): cf. Homil. in 
Levit., c. 4, Homil. in Lucam, 14. Tertullian recommends a delay of bap- 
tism in the case of infants, but he recommends delay, also, in the case 
of adults, which he must have known to be contrary to Apostolic usage. 
De Baptismo, xviii. 

? Apol., i. 61. 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 567 


of the ordinary service.”' It is, also, agreed that after 


the introduction of written forms, for a considerable period, 
each bishop made his own liturgy for the use of the 
church over which he presided, and that this varied in 
form from time to time. As late as the time of Diocle- 
tian, or the close of the third century, there would seem 
to have been no ritual books, or compilations of prayers ; 
since we have no record that any demand was made upon 
Christians for such books, when they were required to sur- 
render their sacred writings.? That the Lord’s Prayer 
was used in public worship in the second and third cen- 
turies is highly probable. It was considered, in the early 
Church, as a prayer for Christian disciples exclusively. 
In the description of Christian services, which we have 
cited from Justin Martyr, the President, or Bishop is 
said to offer up prayers and thanksgiving “ with all his 
strength ;” to which the people responded “Amen.”* But 
whether these prayers were read or not, his language does 
not absolutely determine. It seems more probable how- 
ever that the phrase, “with all his strength,”—or, “ to the 
best of his ability,” is applied to extemporaneous, rather 
than written devotions. It is less natural to suppose it to 
refer to vocal exertion, or to any fervency of that sort.* 
The quite recent recovery of a document still more ancient 
than the writings of Justin, throws some light upon this 
inquiry. Towards the close of his Epistle to the Corin- 
thians, Clement of Rome introduces (A. D. 96 or 97) a 


1 Antigq., xiii. 5, 1. 2 Bingham, Jbid., ὃ 3. 3 Apol. i. 67. 

‘This is Prof. Lightfoot’s opinion, also. See his Ep. of Clement, Ap- 
pendix, p. 271n.1. The same phrase—éo7 divayuc—is used by Gregory 
of Nazianzum (Orat. iv. 12), but not with reference exclusively to the 
singing of the song of Moses. It refers, in Gregory, to three acts of 
Christian worshippers,—the purifying of soul and body (ἁγνισάμενοι καὶ 
σώματα καὶ ψυχάς), the harmony of voice, and the union in the Spirit 
(συναρμοσθέντες Ivebuare). 


568 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIAN:TY. 


series of connected petitions to God of such a character as 
strongly to suggest that they are extracted from an es- 
tablished liturgy. Yet they do not purport to be a quota- 
tion from such a composition. A not improbable hypo- 
thesis is that they are a part of the fixed form which Cle- 
ment used in the Roman Church; which, however, was 
held in memory, but not reduced to writing. If this 
theory be accepted, these passages may be considered to 
mark the transition from free extemporaneous utterances 
to established forms. They have the character of a fixed 
though still unwritten form. * 


The mutual love of Christians, which appeared in the 
intercourse of those who were of different nations, and had 
previously been strangers, made the name of “brother,” 
by which they designated each other, no-empty word. A 
Christian, leaving his home, bore letters signifying his con- 
nection with the Church; and these ensured him a cordial 
hospitality in the places, however distant, to which he 
might travel. The power of the fraternal bond is signally 
manifest in the fact that the great differences between 
the Jewish and the Gentile convert, which were of such 
a character that the Church at the outset might almost be 
said to exist in two branches, did not prevent a mutual 
recognition and fellowship. The Apostles at Jerusalem 
gave the right hand of fellowship to the Gentile disciples, 
and the Apostle Paul in turn gathered from this class con- 
tributions which served as a token of fraternal esteem for 
the mother Church. The bounds of nationality were broken 
down, and the spectaele was presented of men widely re- 
moved from one another in language, culture, and social 
rank, blending in one family. 

1 Compare Prof. Lightfoot, /. 6. See also, the excellent article of Mr. 


C. J. H. Ropes, the New Manuscript of Clement of Rome, in the Presb. 
Quart. Rev., April, 1877. 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 569 


With respect to the relation of Christians to heathen 
society about them, it was of course felt as a paramount 
obligation to avoid all participation in employments and 
recreations which were tainted with heathenism, or which 
savored of cruelty or licentiousness. 

The grounds of the refusal of Christians to attend the 
public games and theatres, are set forth, at a later day, by 
Tertullian in his tract de Spectaculis. The heathen urged 
that the enjoyments of the eye and ear are not inconsistent 
with religion, and charged that Christians austerely ab- 
stained from pleasures of this nature, in order that, being 
trained to despise life, they might resign it the more will- 
ingly.’ It was said that all things are made by God, and 
must be good as coming from Him. But there is a vast 
difference, Tertullian replies, between things as originally 
made, and the same after they have become corrupt. Some 
said that there was no express prohibition of the circus or 
theatre, in the Scriptures. Yet, says Tertullian, we are com- 
manded not to walk in the counsel of the ungodly, or stand 
in the way of sinners (Ps. i. 1). We are to keep clear of" 
evil companionship. The first main objection against the 
public shows is that in their origin and arrangements they 
are based on idolatry. The games (ludi) were in honor 
of the deities or of the dead. All the decorations of the 
circus are monuments and emblems of heathenism. <A 
Christian may enter such places, may even go into heathen 
temples, if he has some honest errand, which is not con- 
nected with heathen beliefs or worship. He cannot avoid 
contact with the rites of idolatry. What he has to shun 
is the lending of any sanction to them, either directly, or 
by his unnecessary presence. Equestrianism in its ordi- 
nary use is innocent; but in the circus it is associated with 
certain recognitions of idolatry. The brutality of gladia- 


Le le 238, 


570 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


torial combats was something on which a Christian could 
not voluntarily gaze.’ The passionate excitement that was 
roused by the public games and shows was itself repugnant 
to the tempers of mind which the Christian aimed to cul- 
tivate.? With regard to the theatre, its immodesty was a 
sufficient objection to it. There was a folly and frivolity 
in many contests, such as wrestling, leaping, and running, 
which offended the sobriety of Christian feeling.* The 
low estimate in which the actors in the popular amuse- 
ments were held by the heathen themselves, was virtual 
judgment against their occupations. * Christians ought to 
detest these heathen meetings and assemblies, if for no 
other reason, because God is blasphemed in them. There 
the ery, “Τὸ the lions,” is daily raised against the disci- 
ples of Christ.* The disciple should look forward to the 
grandest of all spectacles, the fast approaching advent of 
the Lord to Judgment.® The treatise of Tertullian is not 
without occasional expressions of ascetic feeling, and fanci- 
ful, even puerile, objections to the amusements which he 
decries. On the whole, however, it is an earnest and 
cogent argument against practices which were either di- 
rectly inconsistent with the Christian profession, or un- 
suited to the peculiar circumstances of a persecuted and 
struggling Church, exposed on all sides to contamination 
from heathen errors and vices. 

Mixed marriages, where a Christian found himself the 
partner of a heathen wife (or husband), the Apostle Paul 
refused to dissolve.?7 He was willing to trust to the power 
of Christian piety to act through the vehicle of this re- 
lation for the conversion of the unbelieving party. Li- 
tigation before heathen tribunals he regarded as unbe- 
coming, and as adapted to bringing disrepute upon the 


1412. 2316. 3318. 4 33 22, 23. 5 3 27. 6 32 29, 30 
71 Cor. vii. 128eq. In1 Tim. iii.2 (Titus 1. 6) asecond marriage is made 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. Sal 


Church.’ Disputes should be settled, as undoubtedly they 
were generally settled, by arbiters called from the brethren. 
The position which the Church should hold towards the 
civil authority was a point in Christian ethics of capital im- 
portance. Here the founders of Christianity guarded with 
sedulous care against the development of anything like a 
disposition to interfere directly with the established politi- 
eal order. The state existed by divine appointment; the 
magistrate, even though a heathen, was a minister of God 
to execute justice within the sphere appointed for him. 

An ancient document which has lately been brought to 
light—the missing portion of Clement’s Epistle to the Co- 
rinthians contains the following supplication for Rulers:— 


Give concord and peace to us and to all that dwell on the earth, as 
Thou gavest to our fathers, when they called on Thee in faith and truth 
with holiness, that we may be saved, while we render obedience to 
Thine Almighty and most excellent Name, and to our rulers and goy- 
ernors upon the earth. Thou, Lord and Master, hast given them the 
power of sovereignty through Thine excellent and unspeakable might, 
that we knowing the glory and honor which Thou hast given them may 
submit ourselves unto them, in nothing resisting Thy will. Grant unto 
them, therefore, health, peace, concord, stability, that they may admin- 
ister the government which Thou hast given them without failure. For 
Thou, O Heavenly Master, King of the ages, givest to the sons of men 
glory and honor and power over all things that are upon the earth. Do 


a disqualification for the officeof bishop or deacon. That is the correct in- 
terpretation of the passage, is proved by 1 Tim. ν. 9, where to have been 
“the wife of one man” is required in the case of a widow who is to be 
“taken into the number,” or put on the list—possibly, of deaconesses. 
See Tertullian, ad Uxor., i. 7, Ellicott, in loc. The heathen put honor 

upon abstinence from a second marriage, especially upon one who was 
' univira. The injunctions (1 Tim. iii. 2, v. 9) may have had reference to 
this feeling. See Hefele, Beitrige 2. Kirchengesch., etc., i. 39. Younger 
widows the Apostle recommended to marry again (1 Tim. y. 14). On 
the class referred to in 1 Tim. v. 9, see Schaff, Hist. of the Apostolia 
Ch., pp. 535, 536. 


1 I Cor. vi. 1-8. 


572 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Thou, Lord, direct their counsel according to that which is good and 
well-pleasing in Thy sight, that, administering in peace and gentleness 
with godliness, the power which Thou hast given them, they may obtain 
thy favor.” 1 


Such were the petitions which the Christians of Rome 
offered to God in behalf of their rulers, at the moment 
when they had hardly escaped from the cruelty and caprice 
of Domitian. 

In the Apostolic age, the writings of the Apostles were 
considered as supplementary to their oral instruction. The 
Epistles were written because it was impracticable for the 
authors of them to be present in person, at the time when 
they were composed, with those whom they addressed. 
The idea of collecting the writings of the Apostles, or of 
forming a canon, did not exist. As long as they were 
alive, there was less reason for separating the productions 
of their pen from other writings. As long as the memory 
of their teaching continued fresh, the same feeling would 
exist. The early Fathers make much of the living tradi- 
tion which had preserved the substance of the Apostolic 
doctrine in the churches which they had planted. The 
Old Testament Scriptures were an ancient, recognized, au- 
thoritative collection, which was read in the churches, 
and to which appeal was made in controversies. The ex- 
pectation of the Second Advent, widely diffused as it was 
in the early Church, of itself would have prevented the 
formation of a new body of sacred books. But when the 
Apostles had passed off the stage, when the difference be- 
tween them and _ post-apostolic teachers was sensibly felt, 
when heretical doctrines began to be propagated, and heret- 
ical parties commenced to falsify the Apostolic writings, a 
desire would naturally be kindled to gather up the an- 
thentic documents which the guides of the Church, who 


1 Prof. Lightfoot’s 3. Clement of Rome, App., δὲ 61, 62, pp. 377, 378. 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 573 


had been appointed by Christ Himself, had left behind 
them. Accordingly, in the course of the second ceniury, 
we find that the canon is gradually forming itself. The 
term “canonical” signified normal, as constituting a rule 
and source of faith, or it was used as a synonym of au- 
thorized, or approved in this character. In this last 
sense, it was first applied to the Scriptures. The process 
of making collections of the Apostolic writings would go 
on of itself. We find Paul (Col. iv. 16) providing that 
his Epistle to Colosse should be read at Laodicea, and also 
that his Epistle to Laodicea should be read to the Colos- 
sians. By this kind of interchange, and by kindred 
means, by degrees numerous collections of Apostolic 
writings must have grown up. The Epistle of Clement 
of Rome, the Epistle wrongly attributed to Barnabas, and 
the Shepherd of Hermas, are sometimes quoted by writers 
of the second century with a respect similar to that paid to 
books of the Apostles. They were read in churches. Their 
authors were counted as inspired, since the notion of inspi- 
ration was not accurately defined. But in none of the 
early catalogues of the Scriptures is either of these books 
set down as canonical. Towards the close of the second 
century, the old Syrian, or Peschito, translation was made, 
and also the old Latin version. We have the catalogue in 
the Muratorian Fragment; and from Clement of Alexan- 
dria, Origen, Irenzeus, and Tertullian, we learn what books 
were recognized by them, and by their contemporaries, as 
having a rightful place in the canon. In this century, the 
books of the New Testament are referred to in two divi- 
sions, “the Gospel” (Εὐαγγέλιον, or Edayyedexov), com- 
prising the four Evangelists, and “the Apostle” (ὁ ’Azoa- 
τολος, or τὸ ’Aroatodxdv), including the remaining books 
which were accepted as having Apostolic authority. It is 
obvious that certain books—as, for example, the Catholic 


574 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


Epistles, and Epistles written first to individuals—would 
come into general circulation more slowly than others. 
There is reason to conclude that copies of the Gospels, 
early in the second century, had greatly multiplied.' Dif- 
ferences would exist, to some extent, in the catalogues in 
different places. A book that was acknowledged as canon- 
ical in one place might not be so recognized in another. 
Early in the fourth century, when Eusebius wrote his 
Church History, the writings of the New Testament were 
divided by him into two classes, those universally re- 
ceived by the churches (homologoumena), and those dis- 
puted, or not received by all (antilezomena). In the 
last category stand seven books, the Epistles of James, 
Jude, 2 Peter, 2 John, 3 John, the Epistle to the He- 
brews, and the Apocalypse. Of most of these it seems 
probable that they were rather unknown, than rejected, in 
the quarters where they failed to be received. The second 
and third Epistles of John were not embraced in the Syriac 
version, but were generally acknowledged elsewhere. The 
Epistle of Jude was considered genuine in most of the 
churches. The Epistle of James was received by the 
Syrian churches, but wide-spread doubt respecting it ex- 
isted in the churches of other countries. The Apocalypse 
which had been generally received in the middle of the se- 
cond century, was now extensively rejected in the East. The 
Epistle to the Hebrews, which was received in the East, 
was not acknowledged by the Church of Rome, as not being 
by Paul. The second Epistle of Peter, the book for which 
the external testimony is weaker than for any other of the 
canon, is expressly rejected by Origen and Eusebius. The 
tendency to uniformity rapidly induced a coincidence on 
the part of all the churches in the recognition of the books 
with respect to which doubts had been entertained ; and 


1 See Norton, Gen. of the Gospels, vol. i., p. 45 seq. 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 575 


the work of critical investigation into their claims was re- 
served for subsequent ages. 


Thus there arose in the midst of the Roman Empire a 
wide-spread, rapidly growing community, which had no 
other aim than to produce an entire moral renovation of 
society, which acknowledged Christ as its invisible king, 
and yet employed none but peaceful agencies, and owned, 
with sincere loyalty, as a religious duty, the obligation to 
obey the civil authority. In the higher allegiance paid to 
God, and in the consequent refusal to comply actively with 
mandates of the state which stood in conflict with the ex- 
press requirements of the Gospel, even though torture and 
death were the penalty, there was, indeed, a principle of 
liberty, which was destined in after ages to give rise to 
momentous results, 

As the Christian teachers did not directly assail the civil 
constitution, however defective it might be considered, 
so they did not try to sweep away by a revolutionary 
stroke the institution of slavery, which was so firmly es- 
tablished in ancient society. They set forth the common 
relation of master and servant to Christ, the Master of 
both; they declared that the master and slave, as breth- 
ren, were equal; they pointed out the inconsistency of all 
unkindness and oppression with the law of love; they 
enjoined upon both parties the duty of mutual forbearance 
and just dealing ; but they did not formally terminate the 
relation." It was left for the further development of 
Christian Ethics to define the proper relation of the laborer 
to the employer, as well as the provisions which Christian 
justice demands in every form of civil polity. The an- 
cient Church acted in the spirit of Christ, when He asked, 
“Who made me a judge or a divider over you?”? It 


1 Eph. vi. 9, Col. iv. 1, 1 Cor. vii. 22. 2 Luke xii. 14. 


576) THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


sought to eradicate the selfishness out of which all forms 
of injustice spring. The best illustration of the spirit in 
which Christianity confronted the institution of slavery, is 
afforded by the Epistle of Paul to Philemon, a Christian 
at Colosse, whose slave, Onesimus, had fled to Rome, 
and there, under the influence of the Apostle’s teaching, 
had been converted. Paul sends him back—of course, in 
full accordance with the servant’s own choice—to his 
former master. He does not call upon his “ fellow-la- 
borer ” at Colosse to manumit the slave. But he styles 
Onesimus his son, a part of his own flesh, and exhorts 
Philemon to receive him not as a bondman, but as a be- 
loved brother. Paul addresses him thus :— 


“Wherefore, though I have much boldness in Christ to enjoin upon 
thee that which is befitting, yet for love’s sake I beseech thee rather, 
being such a one as Paul an old man, and now also a prisoner of Jesus 
Christ, I beseech thee for my child, whom I begot in my bonds, Onesi- 
mus; who in time past was unprofitable to thee, but is now profitable to 
thee and tome; whom 1 have sent back; and do thou (receive) him, 
that is, my own flesh. Whom I would hayeretained with me, that in 
thy stead he might minister in the bonds of the Gospel; but I chose to 
do nothing without thy consent, that thy benefit may not be as from 
necessity, but willingly. For perhaps he was separated from thee for a 
season to this end, that thou shouldest receive him back as thine for- 
ever; no longer as a bond servant, but above a bond-servant, a brother- 
beloved, especially to me, but how much more to thee, both in the flesh 
and in the Lord! If thou then regardest me as a partner, receive him as 
myself. And if he wrongeth thee in anything, or oweth thee, put that 
to my account. I Paul have written it with my own hand, I will repay 
it; not to say to thee, that to me thou owest even thy own self besides. 
Yea, brother, let me have joy of thee in the Lord. Refresh my heart 
in Christ. Having confidence in thy obedience I have written to thee, 
knowing that thou wilt do even more than I say.” ἢ 


There can be no doubt that the churches at the begin- 
ning were, on the whole, marked by an extraordinary re- 
ligious elevation and purity of conduct. They were made 


1 From Prof. Noyes’s translation (Philemon, vers. 8-22). 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 577 


up mostly of the poor and obscure, who were drawn to 
embrace the Gospel by an inward need, and whose low 
position in the social scale was a standing ground of re- 
proach against the new religion, from the side of its adver- 
saries. Moved thus by spiritual hunger, and by no motive 
of self-interest, they laid hold of the priceless boon offered 
them in the Gospel, with all sincerity and earnestness. 
Subsequently, as the Church grew stronger, so that its offi- 
ces became objects of ambition; especially when it ceased 
to be a persecuted sect, but rather a religion favored by the 
civil power, there were mingled in the ranks of ostensible 
believers a far larger proportion of the insincere and self- 
seeking. There was at first an enthusiasm for the faith, 
and for the propagation of it. There was an unconquera- 
ble firmness under persecution, without any mingling of 
hatred towards the authors of it. There was a love to the 
Apostles and to one another, which was expressed in pray- 
ers and supplications, as well as in substantial deeds of 
charity. In the reformation of men whose lives had been 
bad, the Gospel evinced a power such as put to shame the 
highest achievements of philosophy in this practical direc- 
tion. An inspiration was furnished for the amendment of 
character such as the world had never witnessed before. 
This is evident from statements in the Apostolic Epistles, 
and in the early ecclesiastical writers. Paul, after enu- 
merating various classes of evil-doers, as adulterers, forni- 
cators, drunkards, extortioners, thieves, adds: “and such 
were some of you; but ye are washed, ye are sancti- 
fied” (1 Cor. vi. 10, 11, cf. Col. iii. 7). He writes 
to the Ephesian Christians: ‘Let him that stole, steal 
no more, but rather let him labor, working with his 
hands the thing which is good ”—that, is labor in some 
good and honest vocation—“that he may have to give 
to him ἽΝ needeth” (iv. 28). In the Ephesian Church, 


578 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY, 


there were persons who had been thieves. Now, in- 
stead of taking the property of others, they were to give 
away their own. “We,” writes Justin Martyr, “who 
formerly were the slaves of lust, now only strive after 
purity ; we, who took delight in arts of magic, now con- 
secrate ourselves to the eternal and good God; we who 
loved the path to riches above every other, now give what 
we haye to the common use and give to every one that 
needs; we who hated and destroyed one another, and 
would not even share the same hearth with those of 
another tribe, because of their different customs, now, 
since the coming of Christ, live together, and pray for 
our enemies, and endeavor to convince those who hate us 
without cause, so that they may order their lives according 
to Christ’s glorious doctrine, and attain to the joyful hope 
of receiving like blessings with ourselves from God, the 
Lord of all.”+ Two qualities of the early Christians were 
especially conspicuous and marvellous in the eyes of their 
heathen acquaintance. The first was their love to one 
another. ‘The second was their love to enemies, which ap- 
peared in connection with an heroic patience in the endur- 
ance of persecution, whether in the form of taunts and so- 
cial ostracism, or robbery, bodily torture, and death. These 
sentiments were the more remarkable as found, it might be, 
in persons of little education, and strangers to the tenets 
of Philosophy. It was evident that a new principle of a 
mighty transforming power had entered into the world. 

It would be a great mistake to suppose that the Church 
of the Apostolic age was spotless. Among the Jewish 
Christians, a narrow legal spirit took possession of the 
party called Judaizers. On the Jewish side, there was a 
temptation to the undue estimation of riches and of the 
wealthy class (Acts v. 1-12, James ii. 5). Among the Gentile 


1 Apol. i. 14, 


CHRISTIANITY IN THE FIRST CENTURY. 579 


Christians of Greek extraction there was another class of 
faults. At Corinth, there was an ascetic party which was 
disposed to condemn marriage, at the same time that a 
Judaizing faction appears to have considered marriage 
obligatory. Women sometimes displayed an unchristian 
love for finery, or an unseemly disposition to make them- 
selves conspicuous in church assemblies. There were two 
departures from the Christian standard of conduct, diverse 
from one another, and both of them characteristic sins of 
the Gentile communities of Christians. The one was the 
manifestation of an intellectual pride on the part of some, 
who considered themselves superior to others in their 
power of comprehending truth, and consequently looked 
with some disdain on Christians of ordinary capacity. A 
speculative tendency, and an excessive esteem of theoreti- 
cal views of the Gospel, would naturally connect them- 
selves with such a temper. Such a temper, if carried out, 
would give rise to an aristocracy of the intellect, akin to 
that which the schools of heathen philosophy had nur- 
tured, and not less alien to the spirit of the Gospel than 
was the Judaic pride of race and sense of superiority in 
point of religious standing. The equality of believers, 
which was founded on the fact that Christianity addresses 
itself, not to the gifted in intellect especially, but to all 
classes alike, since it appeals to the moral and religious 
nature of men, would have been sacrificed, had the Corin- 
thian affectation of “wisdom” been left unrebuked. 

The other great evil on which the Apostle Paul had 
occasion to animadvert, in his Letters to the Corinthian 
Church, was the outbreaking of sensuality, in the shape 
of incontinence, and that in a most gross form, and in the 
shape of intemperance at the table, even in the Festivals 
of Charity, with which the Lord’s Supper was joined. 
Individuals, forgetting the sacred nature of this commem- 


580 THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY. 


oration, gave the rein to the appetite for food and drink. 
Indeceney of this nature showed how hard it was to 
eradicate habits and curb propensities which had been 
fostered by heathen life. Considering what the converts 
had many of them been, prior to their conversion, the sur- 
prise which one may feel at such occurrences is diminished. 
These Epistles of the Apostle to the Gentiles present to our 
view the obscure communities which were forming them- 
selves under his auspices in the wide-spread Empire of 
Rome. If they disclose dark features of human imper- 
fection, they at the same time give one a glimpse of the 
mighty power of that new religion which was laying hold 
of the poor and wretched, and was beginning its work as 
a leaven in the midst of a corrupt and decaying world. 


INDEX. 


Abraham, his faith, 221. 

Acte, mistress of Nero, 525. 

Acts of the Apostles, written by the 
author of the third Gospel, 289; 
written by a companion of Paul, 
290 seq.; critical attack upon the, 
299 seq.; its relation to the Pau- 
line Epistles, 315; its close, 316; 
its two divisions, 317; speeches 
in the, 310. 

ZEschylus, 116. 

Agape, the history of the, 546 seq. 

Agrippina, the mother of Nero, 217, 
524; her death, 526. 

Alexander, the Great, his empire, 
49; effect of his Expedition, 56. 

Alexandria, its character, 36. 

Alogi, the, 320. 

Amphitheatre, sports of the, 213 
866. 

reacts view of the early 
Christians respecting, 569. 

Ananus, 537. 

Anaxagoras, 114, 119. 

Angels, belief of the Jews respect- 
ing, 247. 

Antilegomena, 574. 

Antioch, the city of, 56; the church 
at, 479. 

Antiochus Epiphanes, 228, 

Apostles, the selection of the, 459 
seq.; the preaching of the, 509 
seq.; their addresses to Jews, 
509; their preaching to Gentiles, 
511; their conception of Christ, 
512. See Paul, John, James, ete, 

Arabia, Christianity in, 516. 

Aristophanes, respecting Socrates, 
119. 


Aristotle, compared with Plato, 155; 
his doctrine of God, 155; his doc- 
trine of the soul, 156; his Ethics, 
156 seq.; his intellectualism, 157 ; 
on slavery, 158; on contempla- 
tion, 158 seq ; on the immoral 
influence of the Greek myths, 
195; on infanticide, 207. 

Arnold, Dr. T., 37, 404. 

Arnold, Matthew, 330. 

Assumptio Mosis, 250. 

Augustine, 37, 43, 69, 73, 124; on 
Varro, 128; his Platonism, 147. 
Augustus, deification of, 126; bis 
reforms, 135 seq.; his efforts to 

promote marriages, 202. 

Aurelius, M., on fame, 164; on citi- 
zenship of the world, 164; char- 
acter of his “ Meditations,” 169. 


Bacon, Lord, 22. 

Banus, 418. 

Baptism, in the Early Church, 565; 
of infants, 565 seq. 

Barnabas, 58, 478, 517; Epistle of, 
279. 

Basilides, 387; his use of the Fourth 
Gospel, 336. 

Baur, F.C., 170, 320, 332, 375, 375, 
444, 454, 508; on the genuineness 
of the Pauline Epistles, 258. 

Baxter, Richard, 412. 

Becker, W. A., 209. 

Bible, the growth of the, 4. See 
Canon. 

Bingham, 382, 565. 

Blackie, Prof. J. S., 117. 

Bleek, 9, 259, 268, 279, 374, 424, 
559, 565. 


581 


582 


Blunt, J. H., 565. 

Beeckh, 208. 

Book of the Jubilees, 250. 

Brittanicus, 525. 

Butler, Archer, 148. 

Butler, Bishop, on certain precepts 
of the O. T., 18; on the tendency 
of virtue to give supremacy to a 
state, 445. 

Byron, 232. 


Cesar, Julius, 204, 206, 207, 216, 
217; a democratic leader, 50; 
cosmopolitan policy of, 51; favors 
the Jews, 68; deification of, 126; 
his skepticism, 131; his visit to 
Cicero, 204. 

Caius, 386, 513. 

Calvin, John, 565; on the Sermon 
on the Mount, 376. 

Canaanites, the extermination of 
the, 14 seq. 

Canon, the Jewish, 246; formation 
of the N. T., 572 seq. 

Cato, 201, 202; on Greek learning, 
57; his treatment of his slaves, 
210. 

Celsus, 73; his use of the Fourth 
Gospel, 335; his system, 387 ; his 
attack upon Christianity, 540. 

Cerinthus, 345; his system, 386; re- 
lation of the Fourth Gospel to 
his system, 388. 

Christ, His use of the O. T., 6; on 
the relation of the old dispensa- 
tion to the new, 12, 23 seq.; per- 
fect religion realized in, 25; Re- 
velation perfected in, 26; hopes 
of the Apostles respecting the 
Second Advent of, 364 seq.; His 
teaching as to the Second Ad- 
vent, 367 seq.; His relation to 
John the Baptist, 420 seq.; events 
in His childhood, 420 seq.; date 
of His birth, 423; the genealo- 
gies of, 423; His family, 424; 
His life at Nazareth, 426; His 
baptism, 427 seq.; His tempta- 
tion, 431; the early part of His 
ministry, 492 seq.; His miracle at 
Cana, 434; at Capernaum, 434; 
drives out the money-changers, 
434; His interview with the Wo- 


INDEX. 


man of Samaria, 436; a day in 
the life of, 437; His claim to be 
the Messiah, 441 seq.; styles Pe- 
ter the Rock, 443; His conception 
of His kingdom, 443 seq.; signi- 
ficance of His Temptation, 446 
seq.; His independence of parties, 
447 ; refuses to exercise civil au- 
thority, 448; character of His 
legislation, 449; character of His 
disciples, 450; His perception of 
the obstacles in His path, 450; 
His foresight of the effect of His 
teaching, 451; His expectation of 
death, 452; in what sense He 
claimed to be a king, 452 seq.; 
His figurative descriptions of His 
Kingdom, 453 seq.; enjoins si- 
lence as to His miracles, 458 ; 
the means on which He relied, 
456 seq.; His teaching, 456; de- 
sign of His parables, 458; His 
choice of disciples, 459; His re- 
lations to Judas, 460; the reality 
of His miracles, 462 seq.; Ra- 
tionalistic conception of, 464; 
nature of His miracles, 465 seq. ; 
upon the relation of the Gospel 
to the old Dispensation, 469 seq.; 
the fact of His resurrection, 506 
seq.; the Apostles’ Conception of, 
512 seq. 

Christianity, an historical religion, 
1; its organic connection with the 
O. T. religion, 5, 6; an advance 
upon the O. T. religion, 6; so 
described in the N. T., 11 seq.; 
the absolute religion, 25; com- 
pletes the revelation of God, 26 ; 
a universal religion, 27; a reli~ 
gion of principles, 28 ; character 
of its institutions, 29; its develop- 
ment since the Apostles, 30; the 
perfection of its ethics, 31 seq.; 
its relation to heathen religions, 
34 seq.; its essential characteris- 
tic, 39; its separation from Ju- 
daism, 469; its spread in the 
Apostolic Age, 506 seq.; among 
the Jews, 514; by the labors of 
Paul, 515 seq.; first preached in 
cities, 516; the attack of Celsus 
upon, 541; hostility of Roman 


INDEX. 


government to, 541; Gibbon’s 
reasons for the spread of, 542 ; the 
main causes of its rapid spread, 
545; its characteristics in the first 
century, 546 seq. See Christ, 
Kingdom, ete. 

Christians, the early, the mutual 
love of, 568; their feeling towards 
civil rulers, 571; their virtues, 
578 ; their faults, 579 seq. 

Chrysippus, 162. 

Chrysostom, 565. 

| Church, early polity of the, 377 seq. 

' Church, the Apostolic, state of, after 
the Ascension, 472; rise of a lib- 
eral view as to the Gentiles in, 
473. See Christ, Christianity, 
Churches, the Apostolic. 

Churches, the Apostolic, their or- 
ganization, 550 seq. ; their limits, 
municipal, 556; their discipline, 
557 ; their offices were charisms, 
558 ; their observances, 561 seq. 

Church at Rome, its tone in the 
Epistle of Clement, 556 seq. 

Cicero, 58, 70, 127, 130, 181, 201, 
206, 401; on Natural Law, 53; 
on the study of Greek, 57 ; on the 
suppression of religious dissent, 
70; on remorse, 127; on Varro, 
128 ; on the popular superstition, 
129 seq.; his spirit of humanity, 
181; his doctrine of immortality, 
181; the practical effect of his 
philosophy, 181 seq.; on manual 
labor, 194; Ceesar’s visit to, 204. 

Circus, the Roman, 212 seq. 

Claudius, 217. 

Cleanthes, 163, 174. 

Clement, of Alexandria, 552; on 
John’s Gospel, 330. 

Clement, of Rome, 531, 551. 
Clement, of Rome, Epistle of, 556 ; 
its supplication for Rulers, 571. 

Clementine Homilies, 331. 

Cleopatra, 230. 

Clovis, 13. 

Coliseum, 214. 

Confucius, 38. 

Constant, B., 76. 

Constantine, 218. 

Corinth, its character, 519. 

Council, the Apostolic, 480 seq.; 


583 


vindication of Luke’s account of, 
300 seq.; import of its prescrip- 
tions, 303 seq. 

Cowper, 73. 

Criticism, Biblical, at the Revival 
of Learning, 390; by Luther, 391 ; 
by Calvin, 391; by the Arminian 
scholars, 392; character of Ger- 
man, 392. 

Curtius, on the fall of the Greek 
Religion, 120. 

Cyprian, 565. 

Cyrenius, 423. 

Cyrus, 227. 


Danaids and Dirce, 5382. 

Daniel, book of, 249. 

Deborah, the Prophetess, her song, 
19 seq., 224. 

De Maistre, 30. 

Demons, belief of the Jews respect- 
ing, 247. 

Denis, J., 170. 

Derenbourg, on the name Saddu- 
cee, 236. 

Development of Christianity, true 
and false conceptions of, 30. 

De Wette, 239, 268. 

Diaconate, creation of the, 550, 

Diagoras of Melos, 115. 

Disciples, their number at the death 
of Christ, 512. See Christ, Apos- 
tles, ete. 

Dispensation, the Jewish, distin- 
guished from the Christian, 23. 

Dillinger, 60, 198, 208, 235. 

Dorner, J. A., 253, 254, 513. 

Dwight, Prof. Theodore, 54. 


Ebionism, 383 seq. 

“Ecce Homo,” 452, 453. 

Ecclesiastes, book of, 9. 

Edwards, Jonathan, 146. 

Elders, their function, 554. 

Ellicott, 284. 

ee a Roman, deification of, 

Ennius, 124. 

Enoch, book of, 250. 

Ephesus, its character, 520. 

Epictetus, on the Roman Empire, 
61; on love to enemies, 165; on 
resignation, 165; on slavery, 171; 


584 


on forbearance, 177 ; on the Cynic 
Missionary, 188. 


Epicurus, his Theology, 160 seq.; . 


his Ethics, 162; spread of his 
philosophy, 186. 

Episcopacy, in the early church, 
378 seq.; rise of, 551 seq. 

Essenes, the, their original charac- 
ter, 387, 239 seq. 

Euemerus, 115. 

Euripides, his skeptical tendency, 
116. 

Eusebius, 266, 278, 327, 328, 329, 
330, 331, 332, 333, 334, 360, 515, 
522. 

Eutychius, bp. of Constantinople, 
503. 

Evangelists, their office, 555. 

Ewald, 5, 11, 26, 223, 225, 234, 241, 
252, 304, 305, 450, 530. 

Ezra, 226. 


Farrar, F. W., 372, 423; on the 
date of the Crucifixion, 412. 

Flavius Clemens, 522. 

Flavia Domitilla, 522. 

Friedliinder, L., 60, 61, 62, 65, 133, 
193, 202, 211, 213, 522, 531. 


Galilee, its condition at the birth of 
Christ, 255. 

Germann, W., 515. 

Gfroérer, 247. 

Gibbon 59, 528; on the Golden 
Rule, 38; on the hold of ancient 
polytheism upon life, 136; his 
reasons for the spread of Christi- 
anity, 543 seq. 

Gieseler, 198 ; on the origin of the 
Gospels, 264. 

Gladiatorial combats, their origin 
and character, 213 seq.; view of 
Christians respecting, 570. 

Gnosticism, notices of, in the N. T., 
347 ; characteristics of, 385. See 
Cerinthus, Basilides, Valentinus. 

Godet, F., 352, 357, 461. 

Golden Rule, the, 380. 

Gospel, hypothesis of a primitive 
written, 263 seq.; hypothesis of a 
primitive oral, 267. 

Gospels, Apocryphal, 358 seq. 

Gospel, Fourth, compared with the 


INDEX. 


synoptics, 338 seq., 343; dis- 
courses in the, 342; Catholic 
spirit of the, 344; relation of 
its doctrine to that of Philo, 345; 
not dualistic, 345; its relation 
to the Apocalypse, 346 seq.; the 
work of one writer, 350; com- 
posed at one heat, 350 ; its author 
a Jew, 351; independence of its 
author, 353; historical spirit of 
its author, 354 seq.; its author’s 
love to Jesus, 357; if spurious, 
an anomalous product, 358 seq. ; 
power and elevation of the, 361; 
on the Second Advent, 376. 

Gospel, Fourth, the genuineness of 
the, 320 seq.; testimony of Poly- 
carp to, 321 seq.; of the Mura- 
torian Canon to, 330; of Clement 
of Alexand. to, 330; from Jus- 
tin Martyr to, 330; from Papias 
to, 331 seq.; relation of Paschal 
controversies to, 333; evidence 
from heretical sects for, 335 seq. ; 
internal evidence for, 357 seq. 

Gospels, the synoptical, why so 
called, 259; their peculiarities, 
259 seq.; quotations from the O. 
T. in, 262 seq.; sections in, 264; 
mutual relations of, 267 seq.; 
their sources, 284; compared 
with the Gospel of John, 338 seq. 

Gracchus, C., 50. 

Gratz, 233, 237, 239. 

Greece, its condition in the age of 
Augustus, 191. 

Greek language, spread of the, 56 


seq: 

Greek Religion, the, implies faith 
in the supernatural, 74; conflict 
of conceptions in, 75; three pha- 
ses in, 76; origin of its offensive 
myths, 112 seq.; its decline, 113 
seq.; effect of rational inquiry 
upon, 114; alJegorical treatment 
of, 114; theory of Euemerus re- 
specting its myths, 115; how 
treated by Euripides, 116 ; influ- 
ence of the Sophists upon, 117; 
influence of historical study upon, 
117; effect of the Peloponnesian 
war on, 120; effect of the fall of 
liberty upon, 120. 


INDEX. 


Greek Religion in the age of So- 
phoeles, its improvement, 93 ; its 
higher conception of the gods, 
93 seq.; its monotheistic tenden- 
cy, 95 seq.; its doctrine of the 
divine government, 96 seq; of 
retribution, 97 seq.; elevation of 
the, 100; its doctrine of fate, 
100; its doctrine of Nemesis, 
101; the multiplying of divini- 
ties in the, 102 seq.; its rites and 
ceremonies, 103 seq.; its ethical 
ideal, 104; its teaching as to the 
treatment of enemies, 105; as to 
compassion and kindness, 106 
seq.; as to the marriage relation, 
107; as to civil loyalty, 107; as 
to sin; 108; as to the troubles 
of life, 108 seq.; as to the future 
life, 110 seq. 

Greeks, states of the, 48; their 
commerce and settlements, 56; 
spread of their language and lit- 
erature, 57, 59; their character- 
istics, 66, 12; their degradation 
in the age of Augustus, 192. 

Gregory, C. R., 320. 

Grote, George, on a passage of 
Bishop Butler, 19; on the decline 
of the Greek mythology, 114; on 
the genuineness of Plato’s dia- 
logues, 338. 


Hadley, J. 53. 

Harmonists, method of the, 404 seq. 

Hase, K., 349. 

Hausrath, 236, 240, 243, 428. 

Heathen Religion, its relation to 
Christianity, 34 seq.; law and 
prophecy in, 35; immorality con- 
nected with its worship, 198. 

Hebrew People, purpose of God re- 
specting the, 35; religious ad- 
vantage of, 36 seq. 

Hebrews, Gospel of the, 281. 

Hefele, 532, 571. 

Herder, 12. 

Herod, “the Great,’ 230 seq.; his 
characteristics, 231; his edifices, 
232; the massacre by, at Eethle- 
hem, 422. 

Herod Agrippa, 217. 


585 


Herod Antipas, his relation to 
John the Baptist, 438. 

Herodias, 438. 

Herodotus, 48, 117; on the doc- 
trine of Nemesis, 101. 

Hilary Ambrosiaster, 552, 554. 

Hilgenfeld, 258, 283, 328 ; his criti- 
cism of the third Gospel, 295 


seq. 

Hinpokyiiis 336. 

Holtzmann, H. J., 259, 260, 261, 
262, 263, 266, 278, 283, 290, 298, 
350, 397, 450. 

Homeric Theology, on the nature 
and character of the gods, 76 
seq-; on the administration of 
the world, 80; on the relation of 
the gods to each other, 81 seq. ; 
on the supremacy of Zeus, 82 ; 
on the modes of divine revelation, 
82 seq.; on piety and the expres- 
sions of it in worship and con- 
duct, 84 seq.; on practical duties, 
86 seq.; on the treatment of ene- 
mies, 87 seq.; on hospitality, 89 ; 
on sin, retribution, and atone- 
ment, 89 seq.; on life, death, and 
immortality, 91 seq. 

Homologoumena, 574. 

Honorius, 218. 

Howson, J. 8., 517, 565. 

Hyrcanus I., 229. 


Tenatius, 382, 551, 555, 575. 

Thne, Prof., 76. 

Immortality, doctrine of, 8; in the 
O. T., 8; not the substance of 
Christianity, 39. See Socrates, 
Plato, Aristotle. 

Infanticide, 205; in ancientsociety, 
206 seq. 

Irenzeus, 276, 278, 320, 324, 326, 
328, 329, 379, 386, 388, 565, 566; 
his relations to Polycarp, 321 sey; 
errors of, 325 seq. 

Isocrates, 38, 114. 

Tsrael, 224. 

Italy, condition of, in the age of 
Augustus, 193. 


Jacob, F., 197. 
Jamblichus, 178. 


586 


James, the several Apostles of this 
name, 424, 514. 

James, the brother of Christ, 479; 
at the council at Jerusalem, 481, 

James, the brother of John, 478. 

Jeremiah, the Prophet, his predic- 
tion of the new covenant, 10. 

Jerome, 552, 554. 

Jerusalem, siege of, 538 seq. 

Jews, their acquaintance with Greek, 
58; their dispersion, 67; in 
Egypt, 68; at Antioch, 68; in 
Rome, 68 ; favored by Julius Ce- 
sar, 69; Tacitus respecting the, 
69; their rigid monotheism, 69; 
their national unity, 221; effect 
of their abode in Egypt, 221 ; or- 
ganized as a nation, 222; the 
character of their religion, 222; 
under a monarchy, 223 seq.; di- 
vision of their kingdom, 224; the 
Exile of the, 224; prophesy 
among the, 225; deliverance of 
them by Cyrus, 225; under the Ha- 
giocracy, 226; under the Greeks, 
227; their resistance to heathen 
influences, 228; under the Mac- 
cabees, 228 seq.; under the Ro- 
mans and Idumean princes, 230 
seq.; their condition under Herod, 
231; led by the Pharisees, 233 
seq.; parties among the, 233 seq.; 
their synagogues, 243 seq. ; their 
courts, 245 seq.; their theology 
at the Christian era, 246; their 
Messianic expectation, 248 566.» 
in Alexandria, 253 seq. 

Job, book of, 9. 

John, the Apostle, in Asia Minor, 
327 seq., 515, 534. See Gospel, 
the Fourth, Gospel the Fourth, gen- 
uineness of the. 

John the Baptist, 9; his character 
and work, 417 seq.; not one of 
the Essenes, 418 ; elements of his 
preaching, 419; his baptism, 420; 
effect of his preaching, 420; his 
connection with Jesus, 420 seq., 
427 seq.; his doubt respecting 
Jesus, 430 ; his death, 439 seq. 

John, First Epistle of, its relation 
to the Fourth Gospel, 337. 

Josephus, 67, 217, 229, 230, 232, 


INDEX. 


233, 234, 235, 238, 239, 240, 245, 
255, 418, 420, 422, 423, 538, 535, 
536, 537, 539. 

Jowett, Prof., 206; on the morals 
of ancient heathenism, 220. 

Judaizers, at Rome, 520. 

Judas Iscariot, 460. 

Julian, the Emperor, 73. 

Jus feciale, 53. 

Jus gentium, 52 seq. 

Justin Martyr, 147, 236, 249, 281, 
286, 287, 330, 384, 547, 548, 563, 
564, 565, 578. 

Juvenal, 192, 194, 204, 210. 


Keim, 242, 327, 336, 344. 

Kingdom of God, its rise and pro- 
gress, 4; its theocratic stage, 7, 27; 
made universal through Christ, 
27. 

Kuenen, 247. 


Lactantius, 41. 

Lardner, N., 524. 

Latin language, its boundaries, 58, 
60 


Laurent, F., 40. 

Law, Roman, see Romans. 

Lightfoot, Prof. J. B., 167, 169, 244, 
277, 278, 279, 280, 293, 302, 309, 
332, 333, 366, 387, 388, 424, 470, 
478, 481, 522, 523, 531, 532, 551, 
552, 557, 567. 

Lipsius, 253, 304, 515. 

Livy, 199, 403. 

Locke, John, 146. 

Lucan, 172. 

Lucian, 71, 541. 

Lucretius, his theology, 160. 

Luke, mention of, by Paul, 286; 
sources of his information, 289 ; 
a Pauline disciple, 290; his cre- 
dibility, 293 ; his style, 317 seq. 

Luke, Gospel of, used by Justin 
Martyr, 287 ; its relation to Mar- 
cion’s Gospel, 287 seq.; Hilgen- 
feld’s theory of the, 295 seq. See 
Gospels, Synoptical ; Luke; Luke, 
the writings of. 

Luke, the writings of, 286 seq.; 
attacks upon the credibility of, 
293 seq., 299, 309 seq. 

Luthardt, 320. 


INDEX. 


Luther, 565. 
Lutterbeck, 236. 


Maccabees, the, 228. 

Maccabeus, Jonathan, 229. 

Maccabeus, Judas, 228; his alli- 
ance with the Romans, 229; his 
relation to the Pharisees, 235. 

Maccabeus, Simon, 229. 

Maine, Sir H., 54; on the influence 
of Stoicism, 171. 

Marcion, his Gospel, 287; his ac- 
quaintance with John’s Gospel, 
335. 

Mariamne, wife of Herod, 230. 

Mangold, 281, 307, 352, 396, 347. 

Marius, C., 50. 

Mark, 516, 518. 

Mark, Gospel of, quotations from 
the O. T. in the, 262; its rela- 
tion to Matthew and Luke, 267; 
its independence, 269; not an 
abridgement, 269 seq. ; its graphic 
style, 275; Papias on the origin 
of the, 276 seq. 

Marquardt, J., 47, 122. 

Marriages, of Christians with hea- 
then, Apostle Paul’s teaching re- 
specting, 570. 

Marsilius Ficinus, 141. 

Mary, the mother of Jesus, 421. 

Matthew, Gospel of, catholic fea- 
tures in the, 396; its relation to 
the other synoptics, 259 seq.; 
quotations from the O. T. in the, 
262; compared with Luke and 
Mark, 267 seq.; Papias respect- 
ing the, 278 seq.; was it written 
in Aramaic? 281 seq.; its credi- 
bility, 283 seq 

Merivale, C., 47, 54, 198, 524, 529. 

Messalina, 202. 

Messiah, the expectation of, 8, 228, 
248 seq.; how described’ by the 
siroplicns 10, 26; the Jews’ con- 
ception of His person, 251; the 
Jews’ conception of His kingdom, 
370 seq. ; forerunner of, expected, 
416. 

Metrodorus, 115. 

Meyer, 292, 302, 304, 308, 317, 366, 
374, 419, 424, 470, 559, 565. 


587 


Mill, J. S., on the ethics of Chris- 
tianity, 31 seq. 

Milton, John, 21, 116. 

Miracles, of Jesus, their reality, 
462 seq.; their nature, 465 ; their 
design, 467, 

Mithridates, 60. 

Mehler, J., 30. 

Mommsen, T., 58, 69, 201, 202, 204. 

Morals of Ancient Heathenism, 191 
seq. ; difficulty of judging respect- 
ing the, 194; degradation of, in 
the age of Tacitus, 196; influence 
of corrupt myths upon the, 196 ; 
described by Paul, 196; described 
by Seneca, 196 ; special vices be- 
longing to the, 198 seq., 219. 

Moses, 222. 

Mozly, J., on the wars of exter- 
mination recorded in the O. T., 
17, 18, 20. 

Miiller, K. O., on the religion of the 
Greeks, 74, 75, 76, 118, 188, 139. 

Miller, Max, 75. 

Muratori, canon of, 277; on John’s 
Gospel, 330. 


Nigelsbach, 76, 85, 86, 90. 

Nazareth, its situation, 426. 

Neander, 14, 37, 147, 180, 258, 318, 
362, 367, 372, 394, 395, 422, 423, 
428, 434, 508, 565, 566. 

Nebuchadnezzar, 224. 

Nehemiah, 226. 

Nero, his popularity in the Roman 
provinces, 51; persecution by, 
524; his life and character, 524 
seq.; his connection with the fire 
at Rome, 526 seq.; his cruelty to 
Christians, 528 seq.; his visit to 
Greece, 532; his death, 583. 

New Platonism, 178; its relation to 
Christianity, 180. 

Newman, J. H., on Development, 
30; on Gibbon’s reasons for the 
spread of Christianity, 543. 

Norton, A., 260, 262. 


Octavia, wife of Nero, 525. 

Old Testament, moral difficulties in 
the, 12 seq. 

Old Testament Religion, in what 
sense imperfect, 6; its progressive 


588 


development, 7 seq.; its concep- 
tion of God, 27; legal character 

- of, 28; its relation to Christiani- 
ty, 36. 

Origen, 286, 566; his Platonism, 
147. 

Ovid, 218. 


Peederasty, in ancient society, 205. 

Paley, 315. 

Papias, evidence respecting the 
Fourth Gospel from, 351 seq.; on 
the origin of the Gospel of Mark, 
276; respecting the Gospel of 
Matthew, 278. 

Paul, the Apostle, on the “fulness 
of time,” 1; on the defect of the 
O. T. system, 24; on heathen re- 
ligion, 34, 38; on the unbelief of 
the Jews, 36, 38; at Lystra, 58; 
on worship at Athens, 103; on 
the morals of ancient society, 196; 
genuineness of the epistles as- 
cribed to him, 258; did he use a 
written gospel? 258; his refer- 
ences to Luke, 286; his relation 
to the “pillar” Apostles,” 300 
seq.; his relation to the decree of 
the Apostolic Council, 301 seq.; 
his doctrinal position, 476 seq. ; 
his visit to Peter, 477; his train- 
ing, 478; a witness to the Resur- 
rection of Jesus, 506; the charac- 
ter of his preaching, 512; his 
conception of Christ, 513; his 
career, 515 seq.; date of his con- 
version, 517; a prisoner at Rome, 
522; did he visit Spain? 523; his 
death, 524; on mixed marriages, 
570; his Ep. to Philemon, 576. 

Persians, Empire of the, 48. 

Peter, the Apostle, his enlighten- 
ment as to the rights of the Gen- 
tiles, 474; at the Council at Jeru- 
salem, 481; his alleged Judaizing 
spirit, 299; the labors of, 514; 
his martyrdom, 514 seq. 

Pharisees, their resistance to He- 
rod, 233; contrasted with the Sad- 
ducees, 233; their origin, 234; 
their legalism, 236; their merits 
and faults, 236 seq.; their dog- 
mas, 238. 


INDEX. 


Philip, the Deacon, 474. 

Philo, on the Roman Empire, 61; 
his life and tenets, 253 seq.; his 
conception of the Logos, 240, 
345; his doctrine compared with 
that of the Fourth Gospel, 345. 

Philosophy, its influence among the 
Romans in the second century, 
186; its insufficiency, 189. 

Philosophy of the Greeks, how it 
prepared for Christianity, 140; 
its character after Aristotle, 159 
seq.; its practical value, 180 seq. 
See Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, Stoi- 
cism, ete. 

Pilate, Pontius, 236. 

Pindar, his protest against immoral 
myths, 113. 

Plato, 200, 206; on the characteris- 
tic of the Greeks, 66; on the im- 
moral myths, 114, 195; his pro- 
test against atheism, 138; his re- 
lations to Socrates, 147 ; his spiri- 
tual tone, 147; his conception of 
God compared with the Christian, 
148; his dualism, 149; on divine 
providence, 149; on suicide, 149; 
his Hellenic pride, 150; on the 
properties and destiny of the soul, 
151; on the need of redemption, 
152; on the method of redemp- 
tion, 153; his conception of vir- 
tue, 153; his intellectualism, 154; 
his republic, 155; on infanticide, 
207. : 

Platonic Philosophy, 370 seq. 

Pliny, 203, 240; on the Roman Em- 
pire, 61; his religious opinions, 
131 seq. 

Pliny, the Younger, 172; on for- 
bearance, 177; his Letter to Tra- 
jan, 542, 547, 562. 

Plotinus, his philosophical system, 
179 


Plutarch, 60, 115, 134, 172, 200, 
201, 206, 216, 237, 401; his reli- 
gious position, 72; on the super- 
stition of Nikias, 119; on super- 
stition and infidelity, 134 seq.; 
on forbearance, 177; on consola- 
tion, 184 seq.; on the Gallic wars 
191. 

Polybius, 206. 


INDEX. 


Polycarp, 552; his relations to Ire- 
neus, 321 

Pompeius, at Jerusalem, 229. 

Pomponia Grecina, 521. 

Poppa Sabina, 525. 

Porphyry, 178. 

Preetor, edict of the, 52, 54, 55. 

Pretor peregrinus, 53. 

Preller, 122. 

- Pressensé, E., 372, 374; on the Gos- 
pel of Matthew, 284. 

Proclus, 178. 

Prophets, the Hebrew, their rela- 
tion to the age of Moses, 8; limi- 
tations of their knowledge, 9 seq. ; 
their idea of the Messiah, 26; 
their function, 222. 

Protagoras, 117. 

Proverbs, book of, 23. 

Psalms, the imprecatory, 21, 

Pythagoras, 140. 


Rabbis, schools among them, 246. 

Rehoboam, his arrogance, 233. 

Religion of the Greeks and Ro- 
mans, its relation to Christian 
revelation, 137 seq.; its drift to- 
wards monotheism, 139. See 
Homeric Religion, Greek Religion 
in the Age of Sophocles, etc. 

Renaissance, in Italy, its rationalis- 
tic tone, 391. 

Renan, 280, 292, 352, 529, 530, 532. 

Reuss, 263, 264, 310, 388, 396, 397. 

Revelation, its historical ground- 
work, 2; the design of, 3; reaches 
its climax in Christ, 26. 

Revelation, book of, 533; on the 
imports of Rome, 63; compared 
a John’s Gospel, 340; its date, 

34. 

Ritschl, 304, 471, 482. 

Ritter, H., 148. 

Roman Empire, its relations to 
Christianity, 40 seq.; growth of 
the, 40; fostered a cosmopolitan 
feeling, 42; extent and general 
character of the, 42 seq.; classifi- 
cation of its provinces, 45 seq.; 
compared with previous empires, 
47 seq.; leveling tendency of the, 
51; how regarded by the pro- 
vinces, 51; Romano-Hellenic in 


589 


its character, 55; intercourse of 
its inhabitants, 60 seq.; produced 
peace, 61; its great roads, 61 
seq.; the extent of its religious 
toleration, 70; mingling of reli- 
gions in the, 70 βθᾳ.; senti- 
ment of humanity awakened by 
the, 73; its condition under Au- 
gustus, 191; luxury and extrava- 
gance in the, 202. 

Roman Literature, skeptical ten- 
dency of the, 124. 

Roman Religion, the, contrasted 
with that of the Greeks, 121; its 
divinities and their worship, 122 
seq.; amalgamation of the Greek 
Religion with, 123 seq.; how un- 
dermined, 124 seq.; worship of 
the emperors in, 125 seq.; skep- 
ticism respecting, 127 seq.; effect 
of the reforms of Augustus upon, 
135; the influence of its rites, 
136. 

Romans, policy of the, 48; juris- 
prudence of the, 52 seq.; their 
genius for rule, 66; decline of 
their morals, 197 ; divorces among 
the, 201 ; amusements of the, 211 
seq. See Roman Empire. 

Rome, the Church at, 521, 531; 
union of the races at the founda- 
tion of, 49 ; citizenship of, 50; its 
condition in the age of Augustus, 
193. 

Ropes, C. J. H., 322, 568. 

Rousseau, 65. 

Ruskin, 65. 


Sadducees, their origin, 234; their 
social position, 235; their views 
of the Old Testament, 235 ; their 
theology, 238 seq. 

Sallust, 131, 186. 

Samaria, at the birth of Christ, 256. 

Samaritans, 224. 

Samuel, the Prophet, 222. 

Sanday, Mr., on Marcion’s Gospel, 
288. 

Sanhedrim, its constitution, 245. 

Schaff, Dr. P., 559, 571. 

Schelling, on heathen religions, 38. 

Schiller, H., 527, 529, 530. 

Schleiermacher, on heathen reli- 


590 


gion, 35; on the synoptical Gos- 
pels, 264. 

Schmidt, C., 170. 

Schurer, 233, 240, 252, 253, 233, 
290, 423; on the Paschal contro- 
versies, 334. 

Scribes, the, their office, 242 seq. 

Seneca, 203, 204; on the popular 
superstition, 129; his type of Stoi- 
cism, 165; on sin, 166; on piety 
and worship, 166 seq.; Christian 
character of his precepts, 167 seq.; 
his personal character, 168; his 
relation to Paul, 169 seq.; on sui- 
cide, 174; on the equality of 
mankind, 176; on the wickedness 
of society, 196; on gladiatorial 
combats, 218; on the spread of 
Judaism, 69. 

Septuagint, origin of the, 253. 

Sibylline Books, 250. 

Skepticism, in the Roman Empire, 
71, 124 seq. 

Slavery, its effect, 193, 194; its cha- 
racter in ancient states, 208 seq.; 
among the Greeks, 209; amon 
the Romans, 209 seq.; teaching o 
the Apostles concerning, 575 seq. 

Smith, Dr. Payne, on the nature of 
prophecy, 10. 

Socrates, rejected the immoral 
myths, 114; the occasion of his 
death, 119; his philosophy, 140 
seq.; on the soul, 141; his doc- 
trine of theism, 145. ; on true wor- 
ship, 143; his moral spirit, 144; 
his belief in immortality, 145; his 
theory of virtue, 145 seq.; his hu- 
mility, 146. 

Solomon, character of his reign, 
223. 


“Son of Man,” origin of the title. 
250. 
Sophists, character and influence 


of the, 116 seq. 

Stanley, A. P., 253, 426. 

Stephen, character of his discourse, 
473 


Stoicism, its effect on Roman law, 
53, 170 seq.; its two forms, 162; 
its metaphysics, 162 seq.; its eth- 
ics, 163 seq.; its doctrine of pre- 
ferables, 164; its cosmopolitan 


INDEX. 


tendency, 164 seq.; the Roman, 
165; compared with Christianity, 


172 seq.; its spread among the 
Romans, 187; the creed of noble 
Romans, 219. 


Strauss, his “‘ Life of Jesus,” 398. 

Suetonius, 198, 206, 208, 522, 535. 

Sunday, the observance of, in the 
primitive Church, 562. 

“Supernatural Religion,” 282, 300, 
301, 302, 306, 307, 808, 310, 311, 

Synagogues, their organization and 
character, 243. 


Tacitus, 48, 51, 69, 126, 127, 186, 
202, 217, 219, 402; on the popu- 
larity of the Empire, 51; on the 
Jews, 69; on the Neronian perse- 
cution, 529. 

Talmud, the, on the Messiah, 252. 

Telemachus, 218. 

Tennyson, 116. 

Terence, 73. 

Tertullian, 41, 286, 335, 361, 386, 
514, 540, 548, 565, 566, 569, 571. 

Theatre, the Roman, 212; views of 
the early Christians respecting 
the, 570. 

Theodoret, 218. 

Theology, how distinguished from 
philosophy, 5. 

Thierry, A., 43. 

Tholuck, A., 197, 205. 

Thomas, the Apostle, 516. 

Thucydides, his historical feeling, 
118; on the moral effect of the 
Peloponnesian war, 120. 

Titus, hissiege of Jerusalem, 538 seq. 

Tongues, the gift of, 559. 

Trajan, 214. 

Troplong, M., 170, 171. 

Tiibingen School, principles of the, 
383 seq. See "Baur, F. C., Hil- 
genfeld. 


Valentinus, his use of the four Gos- 
pels, 387, 335. 

Varro, his “Antiquities,” 128. 

Verres, 52. 

Vespasian, made the commander 
against the Jews, 535; his con- 
quest of Galilee, 536. 

Virgil, 40, 66, 67. 


INDEX. 


Von Reumont, 47, 529, 


Wall, 565. 

Walter, F., 50. 

War, the Jewish, its beginning, 534, 

Welcker, 82. 

Westcott, Prof., 262, 275, 276, 282, 
283, 284. 

Winer, 565. 

Women, their character and posi- 
tion in antiquity, 199 seq. 

Woolsey, T. D., 423 

Worship, its form in the early 
church, 563 seq.; origin of litur- 
gical, 566, 


591 


Xenophanes, attacks the immoral 
myths, 113; on the anthropomor- 
phism of the heathen religions, 
113. 

Xenophon, on the character of So- 
crates, 141 seq. 


Zealots, Jewish, 537 seq. 

Zeller, 117, 148, 291, 320; on the 
Sadducees, 241. 

Zeno, 162, 174; on the universal 
community, 176. 

Zoroastrian Religion, the, 26. 

Zumpt, on ancient slavery, 211. 


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